JAMES T. KIRK, A CAPTAIN WHO OBEYS THE PRIME DIRECTIVE

 

Introduction

There are many myths about Captain Kirk, which is an odd thing considering he is a fictional character.  Nevertheless, there are a number of common misconceptions with the character’s popular image that don’t exist as part of the source material.  One example is what is typically dubbed “Shatner speak.”  This is explained as the act of talking as if there is a period after the end of every word.  This is most famous satirized by Jim Carrey during his time with Saturday Night Live.  Another myth is that he is frequent rule breaker, who does whatever he feels is right regardless of orders.  This is even popularized by the show itself most recently in the series Lower Decks where frequent rule-breaker Beckett Mariner calls herself a “Kirk-type” to justify her actions.  Then there of course the classical claim that he is a crazy womanizer as popularized most recently by the pregnant “Kirk was here” cosplayers.

  One of interesting things about the Star Trek franchise is it is so large that many fans, if not most, come into it sideways.  They don’t start at the beginning they start at whatever series was on when they begin watching.  When they come across the original series it is basically history for them.  It is not at all unusual to see on Star Trek fan forums this question posted, “So I just started watching the original series, pretty good so far, when does the whole Shatner-speak start?  I am almost through the first season and I haven’t seen it yet.” There are a few scenes where Kirk does talk slowly however these are normally in situations where the Captain has to be careful with his words.  He is in diplomatic situation or something similar.  The best example I think of is Kirk’s first scene with Khan in “The Wrath of Khan.”  

Over the years there have been many articles debunking these many myths.  Larry Womack of the Huffington Post wrote a great article in 2013 titled, In Defense of (the Original) James T. Kirk, where he tackles Kirk’s reputation of being a rule breaker and womanizer in the aftermath of the Kelvin Universe Star Trek films’ version of Captain Kirk, and John E Price of Medium wrote a similar piece called You Either Believe in Yourself or You Don’t: Star Trek Discovery, James T. Kirk, and the Power of Traditional Memory. Internet essayist and Star Trek enthusiast Steve Shives created a great video in 2018 titled Is Captain Kirk Actually a Womanizer to which he takes down that myth flat.

The myth that I want to tackle is the one that states Captain Kirk is not only a rule breaker but that he repeatedly violates Starfleet’s General Order Number One: The Prime Directive.  (As if you couldn’t tell that by the title.) As all fans know, the Prime Directive states that Starfleet will not interfere in the internal development of a foreign society, and if said society has not yet developed warp drive Starfleet is not even allowed to let that society know that Starfleet and the Federation exist.  The reason the Prime Directive exists is the Federation does not want the exploration of the universe to have the same devastating effect on alien societies that European exploration and colonization did to the many aboriginal societies of Earth.  However, it has it has its drawbacks and some would argue that Prime Directive itself is immoral.  For if a Starfleet vessel were to discover a world that was like 1930s Earth where fascist regimes were engaged in genocide of persecuted peoples.  Then that vessel would not do a thing to stop it.

"No identification of self or mission. No interference with the social development of said planet. No references to space, or the fact that there are other worlds, or more advanced civilizations." Dr. McCoy in "Bread and Circuses"

Kirk’s reputation of ignoring the Prime Directive is a recognized trait of his character and is mentioned both within Star Trek (Remember Janeway’s quote about 23^rd century officers being quick to draw their phasers and slow to invoke the Prime Directive?) and without.  There was an episode of JAG where the character Bud Roberts was able to get information from a terrorist by going over Star Trek trivia.  The incident is initiated by an argument over Kirk’s violation of the Prime Directive to which Bud says Kirk did “all the time.”

This is a myth.  Kirk only violated the Prime Directive once.  Yes, that is right I said it.  He only did it once, and it was under an extreme situation.  Now I know what you are thinking: “I have seen Star Trek X-number of times and I saw him violate the Prime Directive X-number of times much higher than 1.”  I know but you’re wrong and with that let’s go over Kirk’s relationship with the Prime Directive.             

When the Captain is Clearly Obeying

People are so caught up calling out Kirk for allegedly violating the Prime Directive that they forget how much he is a defender of it.  A good example of Kirk obeying is the episode “Bread and Circuses.”  In this episode the Enterprise travels to one of the many fake Earths that they encounter during Star Trek’s classical run.  On this fake Earth they find that the Roman Empire has survived until the 20^th century and they now have their gladiator games on TV.  A Federation merchant ship was stranded on the planet and Kirk is looking to retrieve them.  While they are there, they find some underground rebels.  After hanging out with the rebels they are captured by Roman authorities and taken to the Proconsul.  It turns out the Merchant Captain told the Proconsul everything about Starfleet and the Federation, including the Prime Directive.  In this episode Kirk has the means and the motive to overwhelm the Romans of Fake Earth with fire power and take the Federation citizens there by force.  However, Captain Kirk is restrained the by the Prime Directive, understanding that he and his crew will have to come up with a less direct way of getting the actions that they desire accomplished.  Which they do, they manage to remove the Federation elements from the Fake Earth with no one from the general population being the wiser.

Kirk is trying to find a way out of this mess without violating the Prime Directive

Another example is the episode “The Paradise Syndrome.” In this episode Kirk loses his memory and for a while is living with a Native American tribe whose ancestors were placed on this planet by the ancient Preservers.  There Kirk falls in love with a local woman named Miramanee and marries her.  When Kirk fails the tribe in a major way, they turn on him and stone him as a fraud, Miramanee tries to save him and is killed as a result.  Once Kirk’s memory is restored, he does not go back to the tribe and explain to them why they were wrong and blame them for killing Miramanee.  He recognizes the Prime Directive and ceases all contact with those people. He doesn’t even bother to explain to them how to turn on the Preserver device.

He interferes here but stops when his memory returns

Someone Else Already Interfered

The first batch of Captain Kirk’s so-called “violations” are actually already covered in an established portion of Starfleet law.  That if interference on an alien culture has already happened then a Starfleet crew is allowed to correct the imbalance, try to expunge the interference, or cut the losses and make the best out of a bad situation. The first of these can be seen in the episode “A Private Little War” here Captain Kirk returns to a planet named Neural that he once visited as a young lieutenant, I am assuming before he ran into the vampire cloud, only to discover that the Klingons have shown up and armed the villagers with advanced weaponry and sent them to attack the hill people. Upon confirming the Klingons involvement Kirk arms and trains the hill people with the same weapons that Klingons provided the villagers.  Kirk isn’t breaking the Prime Directive here; he is giving the planet a course correction due to Klingon interference.

Looks like we already have interference

  The next example of this is “A Piece of the Action.”  In this episode the Enterprise travels to the planet Sigma Iotia II.  The planet was last visited by the Horizon over a century ago. At the time the Prime Directive had yet to be established and the crew thought nothing about leaving behind a book called The Chicago Mobs of the Twenties, along with some manuals about early twentieth century technology.  Now the entire population of the planet is living a world based of the gang culture of Prohibition-era Chicago.  Instead of leaving Kirk decides to undo some of the damage done by the accidental interference.  He gathers all the gangs, impresses them with his technology and fire power of his ship, and informs them that the Federation is “taking over” as “the prime operator.”  All the gangs will now have to get in line, Kirk then reorganizes their entire government for them.  

Not good!

The third case of this is one not caused by a slight error but one caused by extreme stupidity.  In the episode “Patterns of Force” a historian named John Gill travels the planet Ekos and finds it divided by war and chaos.  Amid this chaos the award-winning historian decided what this planet truly needs is some Nazism.  Nope, not kidding that is what he did.  Naturally, when the Enterprise arrives, they are shocked to say the least.  So, as such Captain Kirk and Spock go to the planet and after some great difficulty find Gill, who was no a prisoner and puppet figurehead by his deputy, they have him give a public confession and turn on his party.  The leave the planet in the hands of two allies they feel they can trust and leave.    

Exposing the Nazis

Finally, we have the episode “Omega Glory” where Captain Ronald Tracey of the Exter goes to Omega IV.  Omega IV is another one of those Fake Earth, this one where the Cold War got hot the world was destroyed and the survivors are still fighting each other even though they don’t remember why.  Tracey becomes convinced he can become immortal on this planet so he tried to aid one side by helping them fight their war by using phasers.  Kirk having discovered this moves to stop him and then helps the people of Omega IV correctly interpret their own “holy words.” With Tracey now their prisoner, Kirk and crew leave.

Its the captain with the phaser who is breaking the rules.

That Depends What Your Definition of “Developing” is

In other cases where Kirk appears to violate the Prime Directive, he doesn’t due to some creative reading of the text.  The Prime Directive states that they shall not interfere with the internal development of another culture.  Kirk reasons if the culture isn’t doing any developing then all bets are off.  I am also convinced that by the TNG era this interpretation has been eliminated via legislation.  Kind of like how Kirk led his own away missions but by the TNG era the regulations forbade a captain from doing that.

First example of this is in the episode “Miri.”  This episode is also famous for giving us our first-of-many Fake Earths.  The Enterprise arrives at this fake Earth only to discover that they took a dramatic turn from the real Earth in their version of the 1960s.  Trying to extend their natural lives into the centuries, they failed miserably and caused every adult on the planet to turn into a rabid monster that would tear things apart then quickly die.  The children did get the life extension but when they reached a point where their biological age leads them into puberty and they turn into monsters too.  Captain Kirk not only has McCoy discover away to save the landing party from the virus but he gives it to the kids and Starfleet sends teams to help the children rebuild their society.  Fake Earth culture was a frozen corpse so Kirk decided to interfere. 

This culture clearly stopped working

The second of example of this is the classic episode “The Return of the Archons.”  Here Captain Kirk and his crew travel to the planet Beta III and encounter a society that is ruled and managed by a computer.  Most people are kept in an altered mental state where they came to be part of “the body.” Those who are not are quickly made that way upon discovery.  There is evidence that this society was more advanced until a ruler named Landru created the “the body” to prevent war and bloodshed.  Kirk decides that this society is stagnant under the rule of a machine and decided to break the people free. He leaves behind some advisors to help that now free Betans to take control once again.

Weird state!

This is repeated in the second season episode “The Apple.” One on hand the episode is a clone of the pervious one discussed a society has come under the rule of computer who keeps the people in a primitive state.  There are some key differences however. Where Landru kept his people trapped in a 19^th century type society where Vaal keeps them in a Garden of Eden state.  Like before Kirk determines that this society is stagnant and not developing.  Kirk ends up destroying Vaal freeing the people to control their own destiny.

Explaining orders from Vaal!

When Starfleet Command Decides to Ignore the Prime Directive

Then there are times where Starfleet Command and the Federation decide to override the Prime Directive in certain situations.  The first example of this is the episode “Errand of Mercy.”  This is the episode that was the first appearance of the Klingons.  War has been declared between the two powers.  Starfleet recognizes the strategic location of Organian system.  As such we no longer care if they are a bunch of pre-warp primitives.  It’s not our fault the Klingons are coming anyway so Organians aren’t going to be allowed to develop naturally so this is a primitive planet is going to get a sudden upgrade.  Call it a preemptive.  It turns out the reverse happened far from the Federation and Klingon Empire dictating to the Organians, the Organians revel themselves to be gods and dictate to the two space powers.  Treaty is forced upon them and peace is saved.

When you realize they are the ones doing the telling!

The second time we see this is in the episode “Friday’s Child.”  In this case contact has been made with the natives of Capella IV in a mission that did not involve the Enterprise but one that Dr. McCoy participated in.  The reason Starfleet authorized such contact is the planet is bursting with dilithium crystals.  When the Federation sees a planet that produces dilithium crystals like this they get the same feeling that the United States does when they find an oil rich nation: that is a nation that can use some “freedom.”  Starfleet looks at Capella IV as one that can use some “advancement.” To be fair Starfleet wants this to be a voluntary transaction and they are not conquering them.  In the end with the new leader, Leonard James Akaar, enthroned Starfleet will probably have an easier time. 

Yes, we have your crystals

Speaking of involuntary we have the episode “Spretre of the Gun.”  Starfleet wants contact with the Melkotians so bad that they won’t let Kirk take “no” for an answer.  The Enterprise heads to Melkos and when the Melkotians demand they leave, Kirk’s orders tell him he must proceed anyway.  This ends up with the landing party stuck in a Western.  It’s a strange episode. 

Go Away!

The One Time Kirk Did Violate the Prime Directive

There was this one time that Captain Kirk did out right violate the Prime Directive.  That was in the episode “A Taste of Armageddon.” In this episode the Enterprise is on a diplomatic mission to the planets Eminiar VII and Vendikar.  The two worlds claim to have been at war over centuries although there is no evidence of any such thing on the surface.  It turns out they fight their war in a computer simulation.  This gives them all the casualties with none of the destruction of infrastructure.  This also means that the war where people die not only doesn’t stop it never slows down.  When the simulation is made all of those reported “killed” must report to disintegration chamber to have their vaporized and recorded as such.  They also tell the Captain that his ship was one of the casualties and therefore his entire crew must submit to be killed.  Now at this point Kirk could just escape, return to the Enterprise, and get the hell out of there.  However, he has another plan in mind.  He decides to destroy their machines and force them to fight their war for real.  Panicking at the thought of all the coming destruction the leaders of Eminiar VII agree to have Ambassador Fox agree to open negotiations with Vendikar. 

"I'm going to teach you to fight your war for real"

Now let’s be clear, there was no outside interference from either aliens, such as Klingons, or stupid humans who messed up something that Kirk had to correct.  The society was not failing to develop, in fact the whole purpose for this set-up was to allow for the society to continue to grow despite the war.  There was no command from Starfleet to ignore the Prime Directive.  Kirk just decided that he didn’t like what these people were doing so he was going to end it.  Why did Starfleet get away with it?  A novel I once read—that I can’t recall the name of—stated that the Federation was so horrified at what was being described that they chose to look the other way on the matter.

"Planning their break out!"

Conclusion

                In conclusion I hope I have convinced you that far from being a rebel, Captain Kirk was in fact a defender of Starfleet highest command. The exceptions are just that, exceptions, the reason there happens be so much is because writers need drama to have characters go through in order to give us a story.

 

TWO CAPTAINS DUKE IT OUT ON A FAKE EARTH!

 

Episode Title:  The Omega Glory

Air Date: 3/1/1968

Written by Gene Roddenberry

Directed by Vincent McEveety

Cast: William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk    Leonard Nimoy as Commander Spock             DeForest Kelley as Dr. Leonard H. McCoy AKA “Bones”              George Takei  as Lieutenant  Hikaru Sulu              Nichelle Nichols as Lieutenant Nyota Uhura          Eddie Paskey as Lieutenant Leslie                 Bill Blackburn as Lieutenant Hadley       Roger Holloway as Lieutenant Lemli                        David L. Ross as Lieutenant Galloway                                      Frank Da Vinci as unnamed security guard                 Ed Fury as unnamed security guard             Morgan Woodward as Captain Ronald Tracey                       Ed McCready as Dr. Carter     Roy Jenson as  Cloud William          Irene Kelly as          Sirah                    Morgan Farley as Yang Scholar            Lloyd Kino as Wu             Frank Atienza as Kohn Villager               Adele Yoshioka as Kohm Servant

Ships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, USS Exter NCC-1672

Planets:  Omega IV

My Spoiler filled summary and review: The USS Enterprise arrives in the Omega system and goes into orbit around the fourth planet to find their fellow Starfleet vessel and sister ship, USS Exter already there.   The ship isn’t responding to hails and the sensors aren’t picking up life forms aboard.  Since sensors are not always perfect, Captain Kirk decides an investigation is in order.  He forms an away team of himself, Mr. Spock, Dr. McCoy and Lt. Galloway. 

The Enterprise and the Exter

The four men board the ship via the transporter when they fully materialize they begin to look around.  There is no one on board but they do notice all these uniforms lying around with some strange substance in them.  They find all the shuttle craft in shuttle bay and no transporter logs to account for the entire crew’s disappearance.   Dr. McCoy looks into the “abandoned’ uniforms and with his tricorder discovers a horrible and disgusting truth.   That “substance” around and in the uniforms is the crew.  It’s all that’s left of their bodies when all of the water was removed.    They have seen the human reduced like this before but it was under a controlled environment by the Kelvans.  The Kelvans were at least able to restore the humans to their pervious form, providing that the objects the humans were turned into were not damaged.  This however was just plain ugly death.    

The turn on the final log entry from the Exter’s chief medical officer, Dr. Carter, who warns that if anyone is listening to this message is on the ship then they too are infected.  The only hope they might have is if they beam back to the surface as the Captain went down and seems okay.  The Doctor then dies and Kirk glances over and sees the empty medical uniform next to the command chair where he had been sitting.  

Once a CMO no dust

Not needing to be told twice the away team quickly heads down to planet’s surface by transporter.  As they arrive they find themselves in the middle of an execution, Kirk wants to interfere but won’t do to the Prime Directive.  However the whole thing is called off by Captain Tracey himself.  Tracey explains several things to his fellow Starfleet officers.  First he explains that the virus that killed his entire crew is incurable and they can only survive so long as they are on the planet’s atmosphere. 

Captain Tracey shows them around

Tracey then explains the political situation.  There are two groups down here.  The “Kongs,” who resemble humans of East Asian descent, are peaceful, civilized, and welcoming.  The other groups are the “Yangs” who are brutish and savage.  The Yangs cannot be reasoned with.  They also resemble human Caucasians.  As a Caucasian himself, it took a little while to get the Kongs to trust him.  Right now the Kongs are under heavy threat from the Yangs.

 Dr. McCoy uses the equipment sent down from the Enterprise to research their condition.  They have something bad and it reminds McCoy of one of the plague weapons from the 1990s. (So if they went back to Ceti Alpha V Kahn should be able to recognize it.)  Spock however has developed another more pressing concern.  From his interactions with the Kong villagers, Spock has learned that Captain Tracey has been more than friendly.  He is in fact aiding them in their conflict and has gone so far to battle Yangs using his phaser.  As evidence Spock points to an empty phaser battery that Tracey had discarded near an area where Spock and Galloway were attacked by Yangs.  Upon hearing this McCoy tries to defend him as a captain who just lost a crew and had found hospitality amounts these villagers.   Naturally he would want to defend them from harm.  Spock points out that it doesn’t matter and reminds Kirk of his duty. 

One Captain reveled to be a traitor 

Kirk feels conflicted at first about what he must do.  It is a conflict that he doesn’t need to resolve however as Captain Tracey gets the jump on them with a phaser.  Lt. Galloway tries to pull his on phaser quietly but Tracey vaporizes him.  That’s right he doesn’t stun him, he vaporizes him.  Tracey then takes Kirk’s communicator and calls up to the Enterprise to tell Sulu, who is in command because Scotty is clearly on vacation, that their illness has caused the away team to fall unconscious and they don’t want to send anyone else down here for fear of making it worse.

Tracey then tries to recruit Kirk to his cause, apparently forgetting he just killed one of his men right in front of him.  Tracey points out that the guard Wu is over 400 years old, and his still living father is over a thousand.  Tracey said this planet is the key to discovering a super-immunity that can give them a dozen lifetimes.  Kirk pretends to be interested but it is just a ruse to get Tracey to point his phaser away from him.  Kirk attacks him using his amazing fighting skills that are known to be peerless throughout the galaxy.  Actually it turns out he does have a peer, for Tracey also has a similar set of amazing fighting skills. Tracey defeats Kirk.  He places Spock in his own cell and Kirk a cell with a male and female Yang. 

Kirk battling a couple of Yangs!

Kirk gets to practice his fighting skills in his cell as the two Yangs try their best to defeat the Captain.  From his own cell Spock is able to land a quick nerve pinch on the female which allows Kirk to focus on the male and outfight him.  Later the male, who we later learn is named Red Cloud, hears Kirk use the word “freedom” with Spock that he identifies as one of his people’s worship words.  Kirk and Red Cloud bond a little and work together to remove the bars from their decaying cell.  However, Red Cloud betrays Kirk by using a bar to hit Kirk from behind on his head.  Kirk is knocked out and the two Yangs escape.

Getting hit on the head gave Kirk a nice nap about eight hours long.  When he comes to he gets Spock out of his cell and they head for Dr. McCoy.  When they reach McCoy he has quite the tale to tell with his research.  It turns out the true story of USS Exter is the disease that killed her crew could have been avoided all together had her landing party stayed on the planet a few more hours.  The planet’s atmosphere that had exposed them would have run its course and they would have been fine.  They are fine now to go back to the Enterprise.  Also Tracey’s idea of a thousand year life is a delusion.   The life cycle of the people of this planet was extended due to natural evolution.  Tracey’s life expectancy is the same as it ever was.  

Helpful nerve pinch!

Tracey then enters armed with a phaser and looking overwrought.  He explains the Yangs attacked by the tens of thousands and even though he drained multiple phasers it was not enough.  Tracey takes Kirk outside and threatens him demanding that he call his ship for more.  Kirk tries to explain how that is pointless but relents just to demonstrate its pointlessness.  Kirk and Tracey fight again but this time the fight is unresolved as they are both captured by the Yangs.

This is the point we find out we are on a fake Earth it turns out the Yangs are really the Americans with “Yangs” short for “Yankee.”  The Kongs are the Chinese Communists.  They bring in the US flag and try to say the pledge but the way they recite their “holy words” is garbled and Kirk is able to correct them.  As we are about to get our dish of Americana, Tracey being a spoil sport tries to ruin everything by trying to convince the Red Cloud that Spock is the devil.  This almost works but Kirk gets Red Cloud to agree to let him and Tracey fight it out.  As they are fighting Spock uses his telepathic mental powers to make the female Yang, Sirah, to open the Starfleet communicator.  Lt. Sulu beams down with two security guards (interestingly no one seems to think he is a Kong) and takes Tracey into custody.  Kirk explains to Red Cloud and his people more about the “holy words” that are meant for everyone not just a few.     

Additional thoughts: I am really not a fan of Hodgkin's Law of Parallel Planet Development.  I think it just shows a complete lack of imagination.  The crew of the Enterprise should be running to alien civilizations not more Earths.  The one interesting thing about this fake Earth is, unlike the others we have encountered before, this one seems older than us.   In Miri the long lived children were said to be centuries old.  That would mean our worlds probably developed at the exact same time with the only difference being in their 1960s they tried to extend their life and instead caused the zombie apocalypse.  The Roman Earth from Bread and Circuses was an Earth that not only had a Roman Empire but a 20^th century Roman Empire.  This means their Earth was three hundred years behind us.  Yet the Earth that we encounter in this episode had people living on it who were thousands of years old and they all were born after the Great War.  This means out in the galaxy there was another Earth developing their societies exactly like ours but thousands of years ahead of us.  The only difference is with them taking a very different turn in their 1990s.  I guess we can see what became of Earth if Kahn was left unchecked.

One thing this episode screws up is the racial demographics of the participants, which is odd when you consider that Star Trek generally speaking is noted for its diversity.  According to census data at the time the United States was 87% White, 10% Black, 2% Hispanic, Native Americans and Asian Americans were under 1%.  So the “Yangs” instead of being all white should have been mostly white with over ten percent of their number being people of color.  While China may have been the Communist nation with the largest population, Communism got its start in the Soviet Union.  So even if the “Kongs” should be mostly Asian there should be a sizable Slavic minority.   

Captain Tracey won't accept defeat!

So here is what I think the episode is trying to say.  During the Cold War it was not unusual for movie and TV propaganda to try to depict our side as a “good and virtuous side” and the Communists as the evil and vicious side.  A good example would be The Manchurian Candidate. In this episode when we first meet the Kongs they are the civilized, reasonable and productive people; where the Yangs are angry violent savages by comparison.  It isn’t until we meet the Yangs that we discover that they have depth and maybe even a reasonable grudge.  In fact the American audience learns they are us. The episode is trying to challenge the perception of the good guy/bad guy mentality.  We first encounter the Kongs who we see are decent people and start to hate the Yangs for how they threaten them.  When we learn the Yangs are us the episode wants us examine our own prejudices in how we regard certain people as enemies.  That being said, the episode doesn’t live up to its task.

Oh no! Fake Earth time

If any Starfleet captain loses his or her crew it is important to know you can’t ever trust them again.  Captains care for their crews and their sanity surviving them is very unlikely.  First we saw Matt Decker and now Ron Tracey both men of fine reputation whose mind was unable to cope with their loss.  Decker turns into Captain Ahab and Tracey gets obsessed with finding the fountain of youth.  Starfleet needs to establish a regulation that if a captain loses his or her crew that captain must be immediately committed for their safety and that of others.

Kirk explaining what the holy words mean!

              My favorite scene in this episode is when Captain Tracey has Kirk at phaser point and demands he call up to the Enterprise to have them send down more phasers and packs.  Kirk tries to explain that this won’t work but Tracey is beyond reason at this point, so Kirk is like okay and opens his communicator to make the request.  As soon as he makes it to Uhura she immediately calls Sulu over and they are both like WTF!  They try to respectfully explain that such an order doesn’t make any sense, as Kirk predicted they would.  Tracey has moment where he remembered how Starfleet officers actually behave.

When your Captain says something really stupid!

I actually enjoyed this episode.  It starts out interesting with the missing crew, and continue to be so with a captain who was violating the Prime Directive, it is too bad it falls off the rails with the fake Earth nonsense and insensitive racial set up for the Yangss and Kongs.

Holding a relic!

 

FINAL GRADE 4 of 5  

THE CREW OF THE USS ENTERPRISE RUN INTO SOME 20TH CENTURY ROMANS ON A FAKE EARTH

 

Episode Title:  Bread and Circuses 

Air Date: 3/15/1967

Written by Gene Roddenberry and Gene L. Coon

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”        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  and unnamed slave girl             Bob Orrison as unnamed Policeman                     Gil Perkins as unarmed  slave           Tom Steele as unnamed slave        Logan Ramsey as Proconsul Claudius Marcus   William Bramley as unnamed Policeman                     William Smithers as Captain R.M. Merik                   Ian Wolfe as Septimus                         Rhodes Reason as Flavius Maximus      Bart La Rue as unnamed Announcer                     Jack Perkins as unnamed Master of Games                             Max Kleven as Maximus           Lois Jewell as  Drusilla              Paul Baxley as unnamed Policeman                Shep Houghton as unnamed cameramen   

Ships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, S.S Beagle

Planets:  892-IV (fake Earth)

My Spoiler filled summary and review:  The Enterprise comes across the wreckage of the SS Beagle.  The wrecked ship was a merchant vessel that was commanded by a friend of Kirk’s from the Academy, Captain R.M. Merik.  Captain Merik dropped out of Starfleet Academy his final year and then entered the merchant service.  They are able to trace the wreckage to a nearby planet.  

The Enterprise heads over to this planet.  When they get there the crew was surprised to discover that the planet they found is very earthlike.  There scanners reveal evidence of a sophisticated civilization on the surface.  Lt. Uhura is able to tap into their television signals and at Captain Kirk’s request displays the images on the viewscreen.  When the images come up they see a car commercial for a vehicle called the Jupiter 8.  Kirk and crew observed some news broadcasts featuring stories of runaway slaves and gladiator matches.  The broadcaster even gives the name of one of the slain gladiators:  William Harrison.  That also coincidently enough happens to be the name of the ninth US president; however that doesn’t become relevant in the story.  What is relevant to the story is William Harrison was the name of one of the Beagle’s crew.  Kirk feels that he is looking at, and it turns out he is correct, an Earth where the Roman Empire has survived into the 20^th century.

What to do with three strange prisoners? 

             The funny thing is they are neither shocked by the 20^th century Rome nor that they have run into another Earth again.  This is the second duplicate Earth they have discovered for certain, and there may have been a third.  In this episode we are given an explanation for that called “Hodgkin's Law of Parallel Planet Development.”  Basically the theory says that planets that evolve under certain conditions would have almost similar results with only slight variation. 

Kirk beams down to the planet with Spock and McCoy, because you always want to bring your most important offices with you on any away mission.  The three officers go over the Prime Directive discussing both its importance and what it takes to remain in compliance with it.  When they’re done discussing the Prime Directive and their commitment to comply McCoy does make a small joke about wishing he can proclaim himself to be the arch angel Gabriel.  McCoy’s joke annoys Spock before they can really get into it they’re suddenly surrounded by men with firearms.

"We're on your side!"

The group who is captured them consist of a number of runaway slaves.  Some of them have been slaves for life while others had is recently become slaves for converting to the wrong religion.  The entire group of runaways referred to themselves as “The Children of Sun.”  McCoy finds this odd because of his mistaken belief that Romans did not have sun worshipers.  Their leader is a man named Septimus, and his primary lieutenant is named Flavius Maximus.   Flavius Maximus is the more militant of the two and he wants to kill the Starfleet trio.  Fortunately Kirk convinces Septimus that they’re from overseas and he has technology from his ship that proves he is not a Roman.  Flavius is still suspicious but Septimus accepts them into their sanctuary.

While hanging out with the “Children of the Sun” Kirk learns a horrible truth: that his old friend that they came to rescue does not need to be rescued.  He needs to be stopped.  For the merchant captain has violated their most important law.  Merik has ignored the Prime Directive and installed himself as the “First Citizen.”

In the hands of modern Romans!

Kirk lets Septimus know that what Merik has done is in violation of their law and it is his intention to correct it.  Septimus agrees and allows Flavius Maximus to company the three men to the city in an attempt to capture Merik and return him to where he belongs.   While traveling Starfleet trio learns that Flavius Maximus was at one point one of the Empire’s greatest gladiators.  He gave all that up when he became attracted to the concept of universal brotherhood that was offered by the Children of the Sun.

Unfortunately the three of them don’t get very far and are captured by the Roman police.  After one failed escape attempt they finally come face-to-face with Captain Merik.  In Merik’s view he has not betrayed the Prime Directive at all.  In fact he’s was recruited by the Proconsul Claudius Marcus to prevent any interference by preventing any knowledge of their planet to the greater galaxy.  Merik agreed that he and all of his crew stay on this planet for the rest of their lives.  They now wanted Kirk to agree to the same with the Enterprise.  

A renegade captain and his boss

During this time they're trying to persuade Kirk there is some discussion about the parallels between this Earth and our Earth.  We had earlier learned from Flavius Maximus that although slavery still existed in this Roman Empire it had taken on a very different form than the slavery that we were used to.  Slaves in this world actually had recognized rights.  They were entitled to old-age pension and they were protected from extreme forms of abuse.  So long as they were not caught breaking the law or joining a group of religious renegades they were mostly okay.  However slavery still slavery in Dr. McCoy’s very much against what he sees in this Rome.  Mr. Spock, playing the devil’s advocate, points out that this modern world wide Roman Empire had ended war across the globe over four centuries ago.  While the real Earth at this point is development has suffered from a series of world wars leaving millions of people dead. 

Kirk refuses to cooperate.  At first he tries to threaten Marcus by saying he might beam a security team armed with phasers.  However Marcus calls Kirk’s bluff, he acknowledges that the security team could defeat the armies of their empire but he knows through his other guest limits of the Prime Directive.  The Proconsul even suggests that Kirk wouldn’t even need to call down a security team he could attack from space with phasers if the Prime Directive did not prevent him from doing so. He has guards bring Kirk’s communicator and with weapons surrounding demand Kirk bring down the crew.  Kirk calls Scotty on the Enterprise and tells him “condition green.”  This lets the crew know that the away team is in trouble, but prevents them from acting on it.  The whole subplot for the remaining of the episode is Scotty trying to figure out a way around this. Marcus is annoyed but he already broke one ship captain and he will find a way to break another.

Explaining how it is

Marcus decides his best bet is to force Spock and McCoy to fight as gladiators.  The 20^th century Romans don’t watch their gladiators from the Colosseum anymore but from the comfort of home.  All the fights take place in studio.  Forcing a captain to watch his own crewmen die this way is apparently how Marcus turned Merik.  Two gladiators come in to fight the two Starfleet officers.  One is Flavius Maximus who was captured with them earlier.  Now Maximus must fight or be made into a TV special, an inside joke the writers put in there about television production.  Spock is handing himself well but McCoy needs assistance with his opponent.  A hilarious scene occurs when Spock asks McCoy how he is doing and if he needs help.  McCoy responds by pointing out what ridiculous question that is. 

Submit or die

Marcus grows frustrated with Kirk not breaking, Merik points out that Kirk is a starship captain and that is quite a different thing from a regular spaceship captain.  Marcus doesn’t see a difference.  He does however notice the result of the gladiator match.  Spock knocks out his opponent with his shield and then performs a Vulcan nerve pinch on McCoy’s adversary.  Marcus orders them to be brought back to their cells and starts to make plans for Kirk’s execution. 

Scotty trying to figure out what to do!

In their prison cell Spock and McCoy continue to trade insults and bond over Kirk’s predicament.  It turns out Kirk is actually in a pretty good place.  He is brought to a room with a woman named Drusilla.  Drusilla tells Kirk she is going to be his slave tonight. Kirk refuses this, walks around, and demands to know where Marcus is.  Drusilla tries to tell him that it is no trick she is not trying to hurt him she just wants to make him happy.  The camera cut back to Spock and McCoy talking about their feelings or that Spock doesn’t have any.  Then we are back with Kirk and Drusilla and she has now worked her magic and successfully seduced him. 

She knows what to do!

When Kirk wakes up the lovely Drusilla was gone and Kirk was left with the Proconsul.  Marcus, despite his earlier comment, does see Kirk as a different man than Merik.  Marcus actually likes Kirk and wishes he was a Roman like him.  Unfortunately, this was precisely the reason Kirk was going to have to die.  Kirk was never going to knuckle under like Merik.   He wanted Kirk to have a fitting end that is why he set him up with Drusilla so he could experience “one last night as a man.” Kirk is stoic throughout his interview with Marcus.

Kirk continues to be stoic right up to the moment he is about to be executed with the execution being broadcast on live TV.   Kirk is saved by two things.  The first thing is Flavius Maximus rushes out and attacks the executioner.  A fight ensues in which Flavius is killed.  The second thing is Scotty on the Enterprise has Mr. Chekov cause a power outage in the city.  This allows Kirk to escape the artificial Colosseum and head to the prison where he can help Mr. Spock and Dr. McCoy. 

Romans with guns

After Kirk helps Spock and McCoy get out of their cell they are surrounded by Roman guards led by Marcus.  Feeling like being a sport Marcus orders the guards to use not firearms but their swords.  The trio— should I have been calling the trio the triumvirate—hold their own and Merik has an attack of conscience and uses a communicator that they took from one of the Starfleet officers  to call the Enterprise to beam them up.  Marcus kills Merik for this effort but to no avail the Enterprise’s transporter gets the three men out of there.

Backup on the bridge of the Enterprise, Kirk enters into his Captain’s log a formal accommodation for Mr. Montgomery Scott for aiding the landing party without violating the Prime Directive.  Since the planet did not want the greater universe to know of their existence they leave without a problem.  They do however wonder about that religious group they ran into as they falsely believe that Rome had no sun worshipers.  That is when Uhura speaks up.  The Lieutenant had been monitoring the communications of the planet and discovered the truth of the religion.  They were not worshiping the sun they were worshiping the Son.   The religious group they ran in to was this planet’s early Christians.  This pleases McCoy because that meant this world would learn of universal brotherhood and Mr. Spock predicted that it would in time help bring down the Imperial system.   

Additional thoughts: When I was reviewing “Catspaw” I pointed out since it was set to air on Halloween it was the only episode of Star Trek that had a theme which was set for a particular air date.  Well I was wrong and I do think the air date for this episode, March 15, was a nice touch.

Romans with cameras

It is a good thing that both Spock and McCoy are good at their respective occupations because if they were living in a capitalist society and they were trying to be historians they would starve.  Both of them were going on about how our Rome had no sun worshipers.  This is incorrect and embarrassing considering they themselves had run into Apollo earlier this year.  Mr. Spock when giving his casualty numbers for the world wars was factually wrong by millions on the first two and even fictionally wrong on the last one.   The numbers he gives are six million in Earth's World War I, eleven million in the World War II, and thirty seven million in the World War III.   The actual numbers are much higher World War I was fifteen million while World War II was fifty million.  The fictional World War III was supposed to have killed over six hundred million.  Also the presence of Christianity in Rome does not mean the Empire will fall in fact in real life Christianity had been the official religion of the Roman Empire for the last century and a half before Rome fell in the West and thousands of years before it fell in the east. 

Kirk is not one to break

The Roman Empire is my favorite ancient civilization, I enjoy reading about it, talking about it, and teaching about it.  So this is an episode that would naturally draw my interest but it also causes me to nit-pick it.  For example I found it odd that Merik’s title was that of “First Citizen.” First Citizen is a title that the Emperors called themselves.  However it is clear that Merik is not Emperor. In this episode the man who holds the power is Claudius Marcus, who holds the title of proconsul.  Proconsuls however did not have a lot of power during the Roman Imperial period.  Their heyday was more of the late Republic, when they govern territories with near absolute authority.  The Imperial system sets up the emperors to  send officials, who held the military rank of legate, to govern the provinces that had the largest percentage of the standing army in them.  Proconsuls were allowed to govern the provinces that were much quieter and did not require a large military force.  Now granted this was an fictional empire that for the previous 400 years had known absolute peace.  So the government structure might have evolved a little differently. 

Spock and McCoy get ready to fight

                If you have ever read Chester W Starr’s work on Rome you would know that although the most famous question about Roman history is “why did Rome fall” the more accurate question is “why did it last so long?”  The Roman Empire was extremely large and the fastest way anyone could communicate was by letters carried by horseback rider traveling along Imperial roads.  They had no locomotives nor had gunpowder so every inch of territory to be defended with swords, with shields, and with catapults.  During the winter time because the Mediterranean Sea was right in the middle of it the size of the Empire would seem to double.  When presented with an alternate Earth with a different history your first question is “why was this different” and “what changed?”  Did Commodus not follow his father Marcus Aurelius to the throne and did this lead to a stable succession preventing the crisis of the third century?  Who knows?  It is never explored and that is my biggest let down.

I'm a doctor not a gladiator 

               Lt. Uhura’s claim that people could not legitimately criticize Christianity is weird since people do it all the time.  There is a lot you can criticize about Christianity:  the doctrine of original sin, infinite punishment for finite crimes, by way of human/deity sacrifice, and much more.  Christianity is pretty good at criticizing itself which is why is been broken up to so many dominations.  Each domination can tell you exactly what is wrong with all the other dominations.

What is cooler than Spock with a sword?

Then there is how slavery is depicted in the episode.  In the real world slavery in the early 1600s became racialized, a way for white people to exploit people of color.  It was finally abolished in the Western Hemisphere by the late 1800s.  In this fictitious Earth however slavery never became racialized it seems to have evolved into a type of social class.  Slaves are still said to be owned but there is a clear limit on what that ownership means and the slaves have gotten some human rights and labor rights.  This would have been interesting to explore as we think of slavery ending is the natural evolution of things but that might not have been the case.  Slavery had existed in human society for thousands of years it is certainly possible that history could take another turn in a might have evolved along different forms and may have preserved into later time periods.  They talk about it in the episode and it would’ve been interesting to explore but they didn’t have the time to do that.

So not good at fighting!

Lastly, “English”?  They’re speaking English and Spock calls it a perfect equivalent?  How?  English was not a romance language; there was no Battle of Hastings on this Earth so how the hell did English develop?  I know story wise they needed it to be English to pull the whole sun/son line.  That would not have worked with Latin or French.  It was a low moment however.

FINAL GRADE 3 of 5