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.

 

THE COLD WAR BETWEEN THE FEDERATION AND THE KLINGONS RUINS LIFE ON A POOR LITTLE PLANET

 Episode Title:  A Private Little War

Air Date: 2/2/1968

Written by Don Ingalls and Gene Roddenberry 

Directed by Marc Daniels

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                 Booker Bradshaw as Dr. Joseph M'Benga       Roger Holloway as Lieutenant Lemli                        Frank Da Vinci as Lieutenant Brent       Bill Blackburn as Lieutenant Hadley           Majel Barrett as Nurse Christine Chapel      Walter Koenig as Ensign Pavel Chekov                 Nancy Kovack as Nona                Michael Witney as Tyree          Arthur Bernard as Apella       Janos Prohaska as the mugato     Gary Pillar as Yutan         Paul Baxley as Patrol Leader          Roy N. Sickner  as unnamed Villager                     Jeannie Malone as unnamed Native Woman       Ned Romero as Krell         

Ships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, unnamed Klingon K't'inga-class battle cruiser

Planets:  Neural

My Spoiler filled summary and review: A landing party consisting of the Enterprise’s most senior and experienced officers of Kirk, Spock, and McCoy are exploring the beautiful and peaceful planet of Neural.  It is a place Kirk once visited before as a young lieutenant. He found their Stone Age inhabitants to be intelligent, resourceful, and peaceful with their neighbors.  However today on this return trip after they get done admiring the environment’s natural beauty they notice something awful.  Kirk and Spock see a couple of Villagers carrying flintlock guns and appear to be about to ambush a group of Hill People.  Among the Hill People is Kirk’s old friend Tyree.  Realizing his old friend is about to be killed Kirk wants to use his phaser but Spock instantly reminds him that that would be of the violation of the Prime Directive.   Instead Kirk chooses to throw a rock, and it accomplishes what he intends the Villagers stop paying attention to the Hill People and turn their fire on Kirk and Spock.  The two run back to Dr. McCoy but they are not completely successful as Mr. Spock is shot in the back.  The bullet seems to have gone right through him as there is blood on both sides of his shirt.  They call for an emergency beam out and get back up to the Enterprise.

Once back on the ship McCoy rushes Spock to sick bay and tells Kirk that he can’t give him a definite answer on whether or not Spock will survive.   Kirk doesn’t have much time to worry about it because as they are caring for Spock the red alert siren goes on.  The Klingons have entered the system!  Kirk gets the bridge and the bridge crew notices that the Klingons seem to be unaware of them.  Their ship is on the other side of the planet’s orbit, and they seem to be communicating with their ground crews.  Kirk drops the Enterprise back onto yellow alert. Kirk now knows how it is the Villagers were able to develop flintlocks so quickly: the Klingons were supplying them.  The bridge crew consisting of Scotty, Chekov, and Uhura are skeptical to the Captain’s claims.  Just because it took Earth a long time ago from early Stone Age to flintlock weapons doesn't mean it has to take this species the same length.  More evidence would be needed to confirm that the Klingons are behind the Villagers’ sudden technological advance. 

Shot through the what ever that is on a Vulcan

Despite the fact his instincts tell him that the Klingons are knee-deep in this, Kirk realizes his crew was correct.  He needs to find more evidence if he wants to be able to help directly.   A young doctor working in McCoy’s sick bay, whose name is Joseph M'Benga, had his internship on Vulcan and is an expert Vulcan physiology.  He must’ve just transferred to the Enterprise just yesterday because we sure could’ve used his help last week.   With Dr. M'Benga in charge of Spock’s care, Dr. McCoy’s free go back down to the surface with Captain Kirk. 

His worst fear since that airplane trip

               Kirk and McCoy beam back down to the planet’s surface and our attacked by a mugato, one of Neural’s native creatures.  The creature is large with deadly poison claws.  McCoy is able to disintegrate it with his phaser but not before the creature was able to get its claws on Captain Kirk.   McCoy tries to call up to the Enterprise only to discover that the ship had to leave orbit in order to prevent detection from the Klingons.  Kirk tells McCoy that he needs to get him to Tyree’s people for they can help him.  Kirk knows that the Hill People have an established relationship with a group of individuals called the kahn-ut-tu.  The kahn-ut-tu are witch doctors who know how to treat this type of poison.

It turns out Tyree doesn’t just know a kahn-ut-tu he happens to be married to one.  Tyree and his wife Nona are discussing what to do about the now violent Villagers.  Nona wants to find a way to get their guns while Tyree is hoping for more diplomatic solution.  They start talking about the nature of their relationship and Nona insists that Tyree sought her out because women like her can make men powerful.   Tyree says he’s pursued Nona because she put a spell on him, now at first I thought he was joking but this does turn out to be the case.  We see Nona drug Tyree into a trance and starts making suggestions to him on what he should be doing and how he can’t resist her.  This is when the other Hill people arrive to tell them of the arrival of the strangers who claim to know Tyree.

When the couple shows up Nona is able to catch McCoy using his phaser to heat rocks to help a sick Captain Kirk.  She is able to cure Kirk what appears to be a giant turd.  She cuts her hand with a knife and places her bleeding hand on the turd and places that over Kirk’s wound.  This surprisingly works but apparently is going to give her an “in” on Kirk’s mind.

Tyree and Nona

Backup on the Enterprise Spock is going under his own unusual treatment.  Chapel starts to talk to Spock only to hear from our new doctor that Spock can hear everything she is saying even though he is unresponsive.

Kirk and Tyree talk about what’s going on.  Tyree tells them about how the Villagers have developed these fire sticks and are using them to harm the Hill People.  Kirk also learns that Nona who has saved his life also knows his origins.  As his wife Tyree is bound to share everything with her even his secret that his friend Jim Kirk comes from the stars.  Nona confronts Captain Kirk about her knowledge of the phasers.  Kirk responds by explaining to her the Prime Directive, and Kirk actually gives a very simplistic understandable explanation to why it exists.  Nona then tells Kirk that despite its honorable intentions the Prime Directive really sucks.  Nona leaves in anger and Tyree tells Captain Kirk not to be bothered that he knows that Kirk and his friend will help in ways that his wife does not understand.  

Nona cures Captain Kirk

Tyree and Kirk make plans with Dr. McCoy to sneak into the village to see the source of the fire sticks.  Kirk has mixed feelings he wants to help his friend and his people but he also knows if they discover the truth and that the Klingons are in fact behind this as he suspected originally then he fears what he will have to do.

The trio heads down to the village and Kirk, with his supreme fighting skills unparalleled anywhere in the galaxy, is able to knock out one of the guards and get his team in building where the fire sticks are being made.   They find the forge used to create the fire sticks and their tricorder readings confirm that the technology is of Klingon origin.  They hear noise so they all hide and two people enter the room.   One is a leader of the Villagers whose name is Apella and the other is a Klingon whose name is Krell.  We, the audience, are privy to the entire conversation between the Klingon ambassador the village leader.   Apella confesses that he was afraid that his people would soon grow tired of killing, however now they have been killing and taking what they want they find the rewards are great.  Being a conqueror is intoxicating.  He has found some unexpected problems that he does have to deal with.  He tells Krell that the last raiding party only managed to capture one woman and he did not know how to divide one woman amongst a bunch of men.   Krell tells Apella that he should reward the woman to his soldier who killed the most enemies this will show his men of the most warlike among them will be rewarded.  Krell then goes over his long-term plans for the planet and how his people will allow Apella to take control of this world is one of their Imperial governors.

Krell and Apella making plans for ruling a planet and dividing women!

 Then McCoy’s tricorder goes off and they’re discovered but fortunately with Captain Kirk, the greatest fighter in the known universe is on their side and he easily defeats the two would-be planet conquers.  The other Villagers try to stop them from escaping and they easily could’ve been killed fortunately the Villagers aim like Stormtroopers and the plot armor protects the trio from being harmed. 

 Back on the Enterprise Mr. Spock recovers from his ordeal in a very amusing way.  In his unconscious state he asks Nurse Chapel to beat him. This confuses her but Dr. M’Benga said to do anything Mr. Spock requests so she does.  Scotty sees this and thinks she has gone mad and tries to stop her.  M’Benga enters and tries to stop him. Spock however has fully recovered.

Kirk’s training the Hill People in the uses of the flintlock. Tyree is still troubled by what they must do and not yet fully committed.  Nona, on the other hand is becoming impatient.  She decides solve her trouble by seducing Captain Kirk.  Since our Captain is not the type of man sleep with another man’s wife particularly the wife of his friend he refuses her.  Nona decides to deal with this by pulling a Cosby and drugging Captain Kirk to make him more receptive to her advances.  This begins to work and Kirk embraces Nona.  Poor Tyree comes to see Kirk and sees this instead.  Naturally upset as he feels that he is the only man who Nona should be drug rapping, he throws down his firearm and leaves angrily.  As he storms off a mugatoe arrives and attacks.  Kirk is able to disintegrate it with his phaser but is knocked unconscious.  Nona has decided she is had enough of her husband, his friends, and their collective weakness.  She grabs Kirks phaser decides to defect to the Villagers for Apella is a much more daring man than her husband.

Kirk training the Hill People

               Nona finds one of the Villagers hunting parties and approaches them.  She demands they take her to Apella so she can offer him the weapon.  Unfortunately for Nona these Villagers don’t have upgrade weaponry in mind but rather rape.  They talk to themselves and they bring up the fact that if they were they to bring her to Apella he would just reward her to whoever amongst them had killed the most Hill People.  Since none of them had been the top killer that week they would lose their only opportunity to rape Nona.  So they decide to gang rape her right now instead, this way they can each have a turn.  While they’re attempting their assault a number of Hill People showed up.  McCoy had berated Tyree for leaving his weapon on the ground.  They came back found Captain Kirk and now they found Nona.  The gang rapists feel that this was all a trap and decide to cut their losses and just kill Nona.  The two sides battle, McCoy is slightly wounded but will recover, and Tyree kills his wife’s murderer with a rock. The rest of the Villagers retreat in the now widowed Tyree swears vengeance and asks Kirk the weapons that he promised.  Kirk will provide.  The Captain is disappointed that he is the one who must ruin paradise.

Tyree, ready to kill

Additional thoughts: The poor mugatoes these are the true victims of the story.  The strange aliens beam down to their world and into their territory and while they’re defending their territory one of them is disintegrated by phaser.  Later his mate upon seeing the ones who destroyed him tried to avenge his death, and she too was likewise disintegrated.  A sad end to such noble creatures.

So the first thing we have the talk about is the obvious Vietnam War criticism.   The people of Neural are clearly a Third World nation where the Federation and the Klingon Empire represent the two superpowers of the United States of America and the Soviet Union.  The local people’s lives, world , and politics gets interfered with and played around through no fault of their own.  They are but unwilling pawns in the game between the great powers.  Now this presents some issues.  I, for one, fully believe the US was the “good guy” compared to the communist superpower, but we were hardly innocent.  The Federation, on the other hand, just wants to leave this poor planet alone and would if it weren’t for those nasty Klingons.  The Federation motives are completely pure where real life was much more complex.

This also makes me think about the other powers the galaxy particularly the Organians.  What do they think of this? After all this is partially their fault.  If they had just allowed the Federation and the Klingons to duke it out themselves then they wouldn’t be stuck playing these cold wargames with these poor little planets serving as proxies.   Now granted the Klingons might have come here eventually but they would have had to deal the Federation directly first.

Always good to see more people in the medical department

On a lighter note I want to point out how much I love it when we see members of the Enterprise crew who aren’t the senior staff or bridge crew. I mean Dr. McCoy supposed to be the chief medical officer so who are the people he is supposed to be the chief of besides Nurse Chapel? In the first season episode “Dagger of the Mind” we got Dr. Helen Noel now we get Dr. Joseph M'Benga, an expert on Vulcan physiology.  Considering all the pon farring and Vulcan heart attacks that have been happening on the ship the season, we can easily see why Dr. McCoy went out to recruit him.

To Nona sexual assault is a means to an end.  To the Villagers it is the end.

You know this is probably the most rape or attempted rape we have seen in a Star Trek episode.  First we have Nona doing her best Bill Cosby impersonation, by drugging all of her potential suitors when they turn away her affections.  We have Apella discussing with Krell about how to divide captured women amongst the men.  Then Nona, now is a potential victim to a group of villagers at the end. A bit of irony there with the rapist becoming a potential rape victim.  The thing is I don’t actually have an objection to the presence of sexual assaults in the episode seeing as the episode is supposed to represent the horror of war and that has been part of war historically.

FINAL GRADE 4 of 5