HONEY, I SHRUNK THE CREW!

 

Episode Title:  The Terratin Incident

Air Date: 11/17/1973

Written by Paul Schneider

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”, Lieutenant Arex, Gabler, and Mendant of the Terratins                           George Takei as Lieutenant Hikaru Sulu                     Nichelle Nichols as Lieutenant Nyota Uhura and Alice              Majel Barrett as Nurse Christine Chapel, Lieutenant M’Ress and The Queen of Hearts           

Ships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701

Planets: Terratin

My Spoiler filled summary and review: The Enterprise is on scientific endeavor to monitor a gas cloud that formed from an old collapsed star.   This clearly would be a very boring episode so of course something has to happen.  They get a distress call from a nearby planetoid in the Cepheus system that came in an old outdated Earth code.  It was sent to them twice and included the unknown word “Terratin.”  This is a lot more interesting than a cloud of gas so they decide to check it out.

These tools don't seem to be the same size or is it us?

The ship arrives at the Cepheus system and they head to the small planetoid.  Then the ship receives an energy blast during which their shields were ineffective and the bodies of every crewmember glow white. However, when it is over it seems that no harm has been done to anyone.  At least that was what they thought but there was some clear harm to their dilithium crystals.  This is causing the whole ship to lose power and they are now running on the ship’s battery like this was an early episode of season 1 involving either Gary Mitchell or Harry Mudd. 

We are not as toll as we use to be!

As they are trying to fix that problem, they encounter a new problem.  At first Kirk thinks that Mr. Spock is slouching and Spock thinks the same of Kirk.  Then some of Scotty’s engineers complain that their tools have been missized. It appears either the ship and the nonorganic matter inside of it is getting bigger or the crew and the other biological matter inside the ship is getting smaller.  Scans confirm it is the later, the distance between their cells is shrinking so they are getting smaller but retain their original weight.  This also where the fans find out that their uniforms have some biological element to them that is why no one is going to end up naked.

They try their best to keep operating the ship but they are getting smaller every minute!  At first, they have to stretch for things, then use stools, and finally they have to build pullies and leavers.  Sulu loses his cool and tries to shoot the planet with the ship’s phasers but falls climbing the helmsman’s chair and breaks his leg.  The Captain tries to get him to sickbay but the doors won’t open because it can no longer “see” them.  Kirk grabs a pin, now half the size of his body, to get the scanner to read him and open the door.

When you find yourself short you are going to have to adapt!

They get down to sickbay but both the Doctor and Mr. Sulu are two small to use the normal medical device that they use to knit broken bones.  Chapel remembers a smaller device that they use for the inner ear. Chapel climbs the office furniture to grab it.  She almost succeeds but she falls into sickbay’s water tank for aquatic lifeforms and starts to drown before the Captain saves her using a needle and thread. She does hang to the medical device and with that Sulu is on the mend. 

The crew can’t stop getting smaller so Kirk decides that beam down to the planet and make contact with the people there to see if they can stop this.  Spock designs him a new communicator to fit his height and Scotty has a team of engineers who have built a contraption that will allow them to operate the transporter.  Given that they can’t be sure that this will work and hour from now they program the transporter to automatically bring Kirk back at a prearranged time.  

Trying to figure out how much time!

Turns out the transporter is the cure.  When Kirk beamed the down to the planet he was restored to normal size.  The bad news was his communicator was now difficult to work.  Kirk also sees the tabletop sized settlement.  When Kirk returns, he starts sending some his crew down to get the cure and come right back.  There is some difficulty as Kirk has to continually watch his step to avoid crushing any of his crew.  He orders the entire crew to report to the transporter room to be re-sized. 

Table Top City 

Contact is established with the Terratins who explain that they were responsible for shrinking the crew as a way of trying to communicate.  Kirk is still annoyed with the Terratins but agrees to help them as they are desperate and in a time of need.  Their colony was once an Earth colony called “Terra Ten” who shrank because of their time on the planet, and now their colony is threatened with volcanic activity.  Also, it turns out their planet is packed with dilithium crystals that they can use to power the ship.  With the crew restored and the ship repaired the Enterprise finds the Terratins a new place to live.   

"We need your help, so we made you small!"

Additional thoughts: This was a fun little episode, yes pun intended.  The crew has had to deal with all sorts of threats before however the starship getting too big for them was never one.  Watching the crew of the Enterprise try to keep operating their starship after being transformed into tiny people was by far the best part.

Am I the only one who thought it was odd that Chapel couldn’t swim?  Wouldn’t that be a requirement in Starfleet?  I assume they have pool at the Academy.  If not, I think Captain Kirk should order some mandatory swimming lessons for the crew.  There are enough threats in space we don’t need to have anyone drown while visiting a local planet.  

"I can't swim!"

I did think it was interesting that the transporter was the magical cure again.  Very similar to “The Lorelei Signal,” the transporter is the quick cure for the aliment of the week.  Not only is it the TV budget friendly way to send people to the surface, it is the half-hour run time friendly way of curing problems.  Considering all the times it split someone in two or sent them to the mirror universe, I guess it’s a good thing it can also unexpectedly cure people.  Since their clothes also shank did they have to beam down all their clothing supplies as well to get them back up to proper size?

Lastly why did they go all the way to another planet to find the Terratins a new place to live?  I think they should have just kept their little colony onboard the ship.  It would be like having an ant farm only a million times more fun. 

FINAL GRADE 4 of 5 

CAPTAIN KIRK FIGHTS ANOTHER BOY GOD THIS ONE FAR MORE POWERFUL

Episode Title:  The Squire of Gothos

Air Date: 1/12/1967

Written by Paul Schneider

Directed by Don McDougall

Cast: William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk    Leonard Nimoy as Lieutenant 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          Michael Barrier as  Lieutenant DeSalle            Richard Carlyle as Lieutenant Jaeger       Eddie Paskey as Lieutenant Leslie                 Bill Blackburn as Lieutenant Hadley     Frank Da Vinci as Lieutenant Brent                      Venita Wolf as Yeoman Second Class Teresa Ross      William Campbell as Trelane     Barbara Babcock as Trelane's Mother      Bart La Rue as Trelane's Father

Ships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701

Planets:  Gothos

My Spoiler filled summary and review: The episode begins with the USS Enterprise traveling across a “space desert” this causes Kirk and McCoy to muse about planetary deserts to which Spock find strange. However what is even stranger is they appear to come across a random planet that should not be there.  Kirk decides to spend a moment to chart its location so they can come back after they’ve delivered the supplies to a nearby colony. All of a sudden Lt. Sulu freezes and disappears. Kirk goes over to try to see what happened to his officer and he disappears as well.  Spock then starts a search throughout the ship for the missing crewmembers.  When Scotty reports that they can’t be found anywhere they decide to consider the possibility that they may be on the planet below.  Unfortunately all their readings suggest that the plan is uninhabitable for humanoid life and if the Captain and Mr. Sulu were down there they probably were dead already. It is at this point for the Enterprise receives a strange communication with the surface.  It reads “hip hip hurrah, tally Ho.”

This was unexpected!

The good news is this means there is something at the surface and perhaps the Captain and the Chief Helmsman may be all right.  Spock sends away team lead by the navigator-of- the-week Lt. DeSalle, Dr. McCoy and Lt. Jaeger, who is a geologist. When they transport down to the planet they’re pleasantly surprised to find that the atmosphere is beautiful and Earth-like.  The downside however is they seem to of lost communication with their ship.   They look around and Lt. DeSalle discovers a giant mansion.

Kirk and Sulu on display!

They enter the mansion where they noticed that it is full of old fashions and objects on the history of Earth. To McCoy’s shock he sees on un-Earth-like thing: a salt vampire on display. It appears still, dead, and possibly stuffed.  Considering his history with those creatures it is understandable why McCoy would react in the way that he did.  In fact I felt he was rather restrained.  Then in another display they find Captain Kirk and Mr. Sulu frozen in the position that they disappeared in.  

General Trelane, retired, the Squire of Gothos

The away team then hears a harpsichord playing and they come face to face with an unusual gentleman. The gentleman unfreezes both Kirk and Sulu.  He introduces himself as General Trelane, retired, who is the Squire of Gothos.  He explains that he is quite a fan of Earth is very excited that they’ve come to visit him.  He was surprised however because in his observations he did not think they were capable of faster-than-light travel. Trelane goes on to say that he wants to hear all about their stories of conquest and war.  When Kirk objects to state their missions are peaceful, the Squire sarcastically remarks “that that always is the ‘official’ story.”  Trelane shows off his battle flags, he talks about how exciting he finds the concept of war, and then tries to speak to some of the away team by appealing to their national ancestries.  When he realizes that DeSalle is French he tries to talk with him about Napoleon in French, he tries to speak German to Yeager.  Yeager responds that he’s not a military man but a scientist to which Trelane says “we’re all military men under the skin.”

Proud of his flags!

When Kirk tries to inquire into how Trelane does all the things he could do, the Squire explains that his people—that he does not name—have perfected a process where he can change matter to energy and then back into matter again.  When Kirk makes an analogy of the transporter Trelane calls that device crude and explains that he doesn’t just transport things he can alter the matter to any shape he wants as a matter of will. 

Fun with phasers!

While this is going on back on the Enterprise, Mr. Spock and Mr. Scott have figured out a way to boost the sensors so they can detect a part of the planet this actually habitable.  They can't explain why it exists but Mr. Spock comes up with a plan to have the Chief Engineer transport whatever lifeforms the sensors pick up and hope it’s their missing crewmen.

Back on the planet the scientist Yeager, notices some holes in Trelane’s set up.  It seems that he had been observing Earth through some sort a powerful telescope but because of light speed he’s observing the Earth centuries past.   Yeager also notices that although the fire in Trelane’s fireplace burns it does not give off any heat.  DeSalle decides to attempt to take out the Squire with his phaser, as Trelane continued to play his harpsichord.  Trelane sees him in the mirror and freezes the Lieutenant in place.  He then takes the phaser from DeSalle’s hand, switches it to the highest setting and then starts randomly disintegrating things with it.  The destruction excites him for he openly wonders how many people the weapon could kill.  Kirk is angry at this alleged threat, fortunately for him Mr. Spock comes through they're able to communicate with the Enterprise again, and they to Trelane’s annoyance beam away.

As the away team returns the Enterprise, Captain Kirk heads to the bridge with every intention of getting his ship out of there and as far as way from Trelane as possible.   However as they try to leave Trelane appears on bridge.  He demands that Mr. Spock be punished for angering him for which Kirk of course refuses.  Their escape was short-lived however as Trelane easily brings them back.  In less than a moment they are in the Squire’s mansion.  He treats them to a feast with food and wine that have little to no taste.  The Squire flirts with the female crewmembers Lt. Uhura and the Janice Rand-replacement-for-the-week, Yeoman Ross.  He asks Lt. Uhura to play the harpsichord and when she insists she can’t he instantly gives her the ability and she starts to play.  With Uhura playing beautifully he then dances with the Yeoman and changes her uniform into a formal dress.

Trelane on the bridge!

Kirk and Spock notice that Trelane likes to get close to the mirror and rarely leaves it.  Kirk comes to the conclusion that the mirror is attached to a machine which the source of Trelane’s power.  Kirk begins to mock the Squire.  This at first confuses Trelane. When Kirk slaps him with the gloves that Trelane made for the Yeoman, the Squire realizes he’s being challenged to a duel.  This excites Trelane and he gathers some pistols that he tells Kirk were modeled after the firearms that killed Alexander Hamilton.  Kirk then thinks this is a great time to make an entry in the Captain’s Log.  After the Captain is done logging, their duel begins and Trelane tells Kirk that he gets to fire first as he was the one who was challenged and when Kirk tries to object he points his pistol at Spock.  Kirk agrees and Trelane fires first intentionally missing.  He then eagerly waits to see what Kirk will do and Kirk also intentionally misses, but Kirk’s shot hits the mirror and sparks start flying! The machine has been destroyed!  Trelane is outraged as the Enterprise crew makes their escape with their transporter technology one more time.

Kirk would like it for Trelane to leave his Yeoman alone!

Now back on the bridge Kirk orders the ship to turn around 180° so they can go back the way they came.  However as they begin the speed away the planet Gothos appears right in front of them again.  Every direction the Enterprise turns it sees the planet Gothos directly in its path.  The horrible truth is realized: Trelane wasn’t empowered by the machine, the Squire was powerful for real and his machine was powered by him!  Kirk decides the only thing he can do is to confront Trelane head on.  He decides to beam down but he doesn’t have to, as he enters the turbo lift he finds that he is now for the third time a prisoner of Trelane.

Judge Trelane

Trelane puts him on trial for treason, to which Kirk really should’ve responded by telling the Squire that he never swore any allegiance to him that he could betray him from.  It probably wouldn't have mattered because Trelane isn't dictated by any logic and he already had the verdict in mind.  Trelane finds Kirk guilty and sentences him to death by hanging , telling him he will hang until he is “DEAD, DEAD, DEAD!” To which Kirk missed an opportunity here to use the Billy the Kid line and say, “you can go to HELL, HELL, HELL!”

Kirk has something better in mind he challenges Trelane to be more creative. Kirk managed to convince Trelane to hunt him instead.  Trelane excitedly agrees and frees Kirk in his forest so he can chase him.  Every time the Squire confronts Kirk on seemingly even ground Kirk hands him his head, and every time it happens Trelane needs to use powers to wiggle out.  He finally grows frustrated and boxes the Captain in.  It looks like Kirk is doomed but at this moment we learn the truth about Trelane.  Despite his adult appearance the Squire is actually a child.  His parents show up in their species' true energy forms and chastise their son for being cruel to his pets.  Trelane cries and whines so much that his father tells him to shut up and if he continues to cry he won’t be allowed to make any more planets.   Trelane is taken away and his mother apologizes to Kirk.

Kirk cornered! Time for Mom and Dad to show up!

As the Enterprise resumes it's supply run Spock asks Kirk for help trying to classify Trelane.  Kirk suggests he be classified as the God of War or as a naughty schoolboy.  Spock thinks that entry will be interesting.   

Additional thoughts: One of the most entertaining episodes of the series, William Campbell’s portrayal of the powerful boy god is one of the most remembered.  The character is absolutely amazing.  You’re never quite sure what he’s going to do next.  Although he would be irritating to deal with, watching him cross the crew of the Enterprise is a lot of fun.

So let’s talk about the Captain’s Log for second.  I thought Kirk’s timing for his log entry was rather bizarre.  I understand these episodes were made before the coming of VHS much less on demand, the audience who got home late didn’t have the opportunity to go back and see the early part of the episode so the logs would help catch them up.  Now back in “The Man Trap” we had Kirk note his Captain’s Log in the past tense.  His reporting of adventures after they happen explains how he knows certain things for the log entry and is able to explain it to the audience.  The drawback to log entries made after the adventure was already over is it acts as a type spoiler: we know the Captain gets out okay.  Granted it might not be much of a spoiler since we know the star of the show isn’t going anywhere but still if you want to add drama to the episode's scenes Kirk telling the story from the future might drain that.  However, the spoiler at least makes some sense unlike the one from this episode where everything is told present tense.  Here we get the powerful Trelane pulling out his firearms modeled after the very weapons that slew Alexander Hamilton, and Kirk’s immediate response is: “Okay, I’ll take that one.  Now you stand over there why I enter my Captain’s Log then I’ll join you in our fight to the death.”

I’m sorry didn’t Yeager seem to be a little too old for a Starfleet lieutenant?  Did he join Starfleet later in life?  Or did he just choose a career path with a very slow advancement in rank?  If you want to make Captain you better be eager to join the line but if you’re the science departments, particularly in in geology, you’re going to be looking at some very slow advancement.  It’s interesting in the real life military if you don’t get a promotion after certain particular amount of time that officer is usually retired.  Starfleet seems to honor the Peter Principle allowing people to get stuck in the same job for decades.

Another element about this episode that I truly enjoyed was Captain Kirk caught in a reasonable error.  One of the traits that Kirk is often shown to have is his skill as a military tactician, he often clearly sees his enemies’ weakness and how to exploit it.  Despite his intelligence, Mr. Spock often loses at chess to Captain Kirk.  In “The Balance of Terror” Kirk quickly picks up that the Romulan Bird of Prey decloaks before it fires because it has to.  One of my favorite examples is in “Charlie X.” In that episode Kirk realizes the powerful Charlie Evans often makes people disappear when he’s angry with them, however he also notices that Charlie stops doing this when he takes over the ship.  Kirk concludes, correctly as it turns out, that Charlie’s power is limited in that if he activates all his ship’s systems he may be able to overload him.  Kirk defeats Charlie just in time for the Thasians to pick him up.  In this episode, Kirk notices Trelane’s obsession with his mirror.  Kirk correctly assumes that is connected to a machine that he built but incorrectly assumes is the source of his power.  When Kirk destroys the machine he thinks he won then Trelane reveals his true abilities.  Kirk’s logic was spot on and he acted with utmost correctness.  He didn’t make a mistake but he still lost.  This would be a theme that will be repeated later throughout the series and franchise.

Next I want talk about the obvious continuity error.  It was ingenious to create a character who is powerful enough to see Earth from his distance but failing to take light speed into consideration was viewing Earth only from the past.  The issue of course is in the episode they say that he was 900 light-years from Earth so the latest he would be able to see would be the end of the Wars of the Roses.  He should not be able to see anything about Napoleon Bonaparte or Alexander Hamilton.  There is of course an easy way to explain this discrepancy.  We saw Trelane move his planet, he may have chosen to move it hundreds of light-years at a time observing the Earth from different angles, perhaps he thought he was getting a better look at it and thus picked up later time periods.  His father also said that he wouldn’t be allowed to create more planets maybe he has is already created some it was on those worlds where he observed the Earth and he was able to see the French Emperor.

 What is Trelane? When reviewing these episodes I try to stick to the episode reviewed for my information on it.  Even if something is addressed later in the series I don’t want to mention it when discussing the initial episode, because I want to appreciate each episode in the context for which they are made.  So when I reviewed “Mudd’s Women” I didn’t make any mention of the character’s later appearance in “I, Mudd.”  Now when I get to “I, Mudd” I will mention the former episode but that’s because when the later episode was written it was done so with the earlier episode in mind.  Coincidentally when it gets time for me to review “The Trouble with Tribbles” I won’t be mentioning the little furry creatures appearances in The Animated Series, Deep Space Nine, or Discovery.  Although, I will mention the classic episode when discussing its successors.  With that said who and what Trelane is, is in itself a very interesting Question.  His parents say that their child can and has made planets leading me to Question what type of life form is capable of such a feat?  Trelane said that he and others of his kind have the ability to take matter changed into energy and then change it back to matter again in any form that they want at will.  It is good to ask Questions about what type species that could possibly be and if we may ever see them again? Questions, Questions, Questions.

(FINAL GRADE 5 of 5)

INTRODUCING THE ROMULANS: THE ENEMY BELOW OF SPACE!

Episode Title:  Balance of Terror

Air Date: 12/15/1966

Written by Paul Schneider

Directed by Vincent McEveety

Cast: William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk    Leonard Nimoy as Lieutenant 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             Paul Comi as Lieutenant Stiles               Stephen Mines as Lieutenant Robert Tomlinson    Eddie Paskey as Lieutenant Leslie              Bill Blackburn as Lieutenant Hadley             Barbara Baldavin as Ensign Angela Martine          Grace Lee Whitney as Yeoman First Class Janice Rand            Frank da Vinci as unnamed Crewman        Sean Morgan as Crewman Brenner          Jeannie Malone as unnamed Yeoman        Anthony Larry Paul as unnamed Crewman              Ron Veto as  unnamed Crewman           Garry Walberg  as Commander Hanson of Earth Outpost  4              Mark Lenard as the Romulan Commander            John Warburton as the Romulan Centurion                       Lawrence Montaigne as Romulan Lieutenant Decius                 Robert Chadwick as Romulan Scanner Operator              Walt Davis as unnamed Romulan Crewman            Vince Deadrick Sr. as unnamed Romulan Crewman

Ships and Space Stations: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, The Praetor’s Flagship, Earth Outpost 4

Planets:  None

My Spoiler filled summary and review:  *special notice there are also MAJOR spoilers for the movie The Enemy Below (1957).* The episode begins with a rather joyous occasion there is a wedding ceremony about to take place on the ship.  Lt. Robert Tomlinson and Ensign Angela Martine are getting married and Captain Kirk is performing the ceremony.  Right from the go things seem to be a little odd as the Captain is receiving messages of Earth Stations going silent.  Since this is a wedding you would think everyone would be dressed up for it.  You know put on the old dress uniforms instead of their regular duty uniforms.  Poor Ensign Martine doesn’t even get to wear a nice dress to her own wedding just a some white lace in her hair while wearing her regular uniform skirt.

  

The should have put the Ensign in a red uniform it would make for sense for Scotty to be Father of the Bride!

Kirk starts the service by reminding everyone that since the days of wooden ships all captains have had the privilege of uniting happy couples in matrimony, and this is completely wrong.  It just goes to show you that Captain Kirk may be an incredible starship commander but there are just some subjects that he might not be strong on.   This leads me to wonder when exactly Star Fleet adopted the policy of allowing their captains to marry people.  It must’ve been early on so that through all Captain Kirk’s life he has thought the right as being ancient.

Kirk performing an "ancient" tradition 

The ceremonies are interrupted to the sound of a red alert, so I guess it’s a good thing they did didn’t all wear their dress uniforms.   It would’ve been a funny sight to see Lt. Tomlinson and Ensign Martine running around their phaser room in a tux and wedding gown. 

One the bridge we get an update of what’s going on.  From dialogue we in the audience learn that the job these Earth Stations is to monitor the Romulan Neutral Zone.  At this point we all get history lesson for Mr. Spock about the relationship between the United Federation of Planets and the Romulan Star Empire.  Apparently over hundred years before the time this episode takes place the two powers got into a massive military conflict a war that raged on for years.  During that time ships were very primitive compared to modern 23^rd century technology.  The war was fought with atomic weapons and no ship to ship visual communication.  This means no member the Federation nor did a member of the Romulan Star Empire has ever seen the other one.  We also learn that our new Chief Navigator, Lt. Stiles, had ancestors up on that war who were all killed.  But not before reproducing so they could give us our current Lt. Stiles.

The face of a victim of Romulan aggression

As the Enterprise speeds towards the Earth bases in peril they get in contact with Cmdr. Hanson of Earth Outpost 4.  He describes the attackers as coming from nowhere having weapons of great power.  The crew of the Enterprise watches helplessly as they see Henson and his outpost destroyed by this Romulan Bird of Prey.  Spock points out that they can still get traces of the enemy ship on their sensors leading him to conclude that the Romulan ship doesn’t disappear and reappear it simply turns invisible.  He notes to Kirk that invisibility is theoretically possible and the Federation has even looked into this but the power cost of making a ship invisible is enormous but the Romulans appeared to solve this problem.

On the attack!

Lt. Uhura picks up a coded message and being the talented decoder that she is she is able to pick up a visual image of the interior of their enemy vessel.  To everyone’s shock and amazement it turns out the Romulans are in fact really angry Vulcans.  To see that Mr. Spock so resembles the enemies that killed his great-great-great grandfather, his great-great-grandfather, and all his great-great-grand uncles; fills Lt. Stiles with anger and bigotry that Earth had long since eradicated.  It is probably best for everyone involved that Mr. Spock did not exasperate the situation by proclaiming with innocent curiosity, “What is my dad doing all that ship? It looks like he’s leading an attack against us.  I always knew my dad could be kind of a jerk but I never expected him to do something like this.”

Kirk telling Stiles not to be a bigot!

At this point the viewer is transported to the Romulan ship and we get to meet their crew.  All of those who have seen and enjoyed the film The Enemy Below would be pleased to see that the crew of the German submarine is back reincarnated as the crew of the Praetor’s Flagship.  Captain von Stolberg has been reborn as the Romulan Commander, and his loyal First Officer Heinie Schwaffer is now the Centurion.  Unfortunately for the Romulan Commander the Führer-loving Von Hole is now the Praetor- loving Decius.  In addition, like in his old life, he is not to particularly happy with the regime the he is serving.   He also disadvantaged in that he won’t be facing off against Captain Murrell, for this time he is facing James T. Kirk who unlike the sea captain won’t for settle tie.  (How do you like that double spoiler?)

The Romulans!

We learn from his conversations with the Centurion that the two of them are veterans of many campaigns, I’m assuming that since there was this imposed neutral zone the Romulans went conquering in the other direction and that is where these two seasoned warriors get most their experience from.  The Romulan Commander doesn’t want there to be another war and almost wishes for their destruction before they get back.  However he assures his friend that he is bound by duty, which the Commander has already shown when he overrode his tactical officers and told him that the so-called “sensor mirage” was not a mirage at all but an enemy starship copying their movements.

At the emergency meeting of the senior officers, Mr. Spock shocked the now Romulan plus Vulcan hating Lt. Stiles when he agreed with him they given the similarities that Romulans have with Vulcans, and more to the point similarities with ancient Vulcans, it is imperative that they stop this ship from returning home.  For if they return with what they perceive as the weakness of the Federation it will mean all-out war.  With that the game is on and it is now Captain Kirk versus the Romulan Commander!

In the same meeting the senior officers also perform an analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of each ship. They determine that the Romulan ship has both superior firepower and the invisibility cloak but they have advantage when it comes to speed.  Scotty goes so far to say that the Romulan ship only has impulse power, which is actually absurd there is no way that they would be able to get from star system to star system much less all the way past the neutral zone if they only had impulse power.  I’m assuming Scotty must be speaking in some form of euphemism. 

Kirk and Spock going over strategy. 

The first part of this battle took place around a comet. The Romulan Commander wanted to use to fool his opponent’s sensors, while Captain Kirk wants to use the comet to force an invisible ship to become momentarily visible.  When the Romulan Commander sees the blip on his sensor screen disappear he realizes what his opponent is attempting to do and compensates by moving his ship away from the comet.  Kirk figures out what the Romulans are doing so he strafes apparent empty space to find the Romulan ship with phaser fire to the point of burning his phasers out.  This would be sort of like a surface ship dropping depth charges onto a submarine, and it has the same effect.  

Getting desperate 

   

With the phaser barrage stopped the Romulan Commander dumps some debris and the body of the Centurion to distract the Enterprise.  He then relocates his ship before decloaking and attacks with a plasma torpedo.  The Enterprise needs to hit its top speed to get away but the plasma torpedo can follow it into warp.  Without phasers they can’t blow it out of the sky before it reaches them and I am going to assume that a photon torpedo hitting a plasma one would be a disaster with the forces of both impacting the Enterprise.  As it starts to catch up the plasma torpedo begins to break apart.  It still hits but with only a fraction of its power.  Both ships back down on each other and silently work on repairs as a long waiting game beings.    

The two ships sit in silence for nearly nine hours until Spock accidentally turns one of the computers on while making repairs.  This Lt. Stiles uses as one more excuse to justify his bigotry.  The whole ‘need for silence’ really doesn’t make sense to me seeing that there is no noise in space so it shouldn’t be a big deal.  It is almost like Paul Schneider was so big on basing this episode on a sea battle he forgot it was a space battle.  I’ll say it was the vibrations.  That is it!  The enemy ship’s scanners can pick out vibrations so we have to be quiet.  Considering this is supposed to be The Enemy Below in space I guess we can count ourselves lucky that Schneider didn’t have the Romulans start singing.  

Even through Spock making noise doesn’t make a lick of sense and shouldn’t endanger them at all, Kirk decides to go on the offensive and blankets space with phasers.  This has some success as Bird of Prey is knocked around like a submarine being depth charged.  Praetor-loving Decius is now in a state of depression, with the Praetor’s Flagship about to be beaten.  Then in my favorite line of the episode the Romulan Commander declares he will save the Praetor’s pride for him.  They do another debris dump this time with one of their atomic weapons normal reserved for self-destruction with enough casing to make the Enterprise’s sensors think that it was their ship.  Kirk falls for it and they blast it causing a nuclear explosion to go off near the Enterprise damaging the vessel but the shields absorbing most the force.

With the Enterprise reeling the Romulan Commander wants to retreat but faces pressure from his men to finish her off.   The Commander is uncertain he doesn’t really think the Enterprise is helpless and is afraid this might be a trick; he gives into his officers demands and moves against the Enterprise.  He should have listened to and trusted himself because Kirk does exactly what he fears.  Far from being helpless Kirk has the phasers ready and waiting for the Romulans.  

Although each may have a specialty, every officer must be able to preform at every station! 

Because of damage to the ship the phasers can only be fired from the phaser control room itself not the bridge.  So the bigoted Lt. Stiles joins Lt. Tomlinson to make sure they go off.  Mr. Spock goes to check up on them only to get the cold shoulder but it turns out it is a good thing he is there because as he leaves a type of gas leak is detected and it knocks the two weapons control officers out.  Romulan ship de-cloaks and Kirk orders them to fire, but nothing happens.  Hearing Kirk’s calls to the phaser room Mr. Spock returns to it fires the weapons and pulls the men out.

With that the Romulans are defeated, Captain Kirk hails the Romulan Commander and offers to take survivors, to which the Commander refuses the Captain’s offer for it is not they’re way.  He tells Kirk that he wishes he could have known him under different circumstances and then he destroys his ship.  He has a much different fate than the earlier incarnation of this character. 

Final Farewell! 

In the aftermath of the battle Lt. Stiles, having his life saved by Mr. Spock, now realizes that a content of a person’s character is more important than the shape of their ears.  So this what we would call from my early childhood in the 1980s “A Very Special Episode.”  Spock lets Stiles know that doesn’t care about his opinions he was just trying to logically save a fully trained navigator.  Lt. Tomlinson wasn’t as lucky as the Enterprise’s only fatality.  Kirk finishes the episode comforting the would-be bride.

Additional thoughts: Well that was nothing short of a masterpiece.  Although Star Trek doesn’t have space battles as a dominant theme they are nevertheless an essential part of the franchise and can often create some of the most exciting moments.  What a great adversary—I can’t bring myself to call him a villain—the Romulan Commander was for Captain Kirk.  At this point Kirk had faced his best friend mutated into a god, an alien with so muchtechnical power it dwarfed the Enterprise, a pimp, a broken transporter, a Salt Vampire, a space virus, and boy god.  This was the first time he faced someone so much like himself—even more than when he was split in two—it was lot of fun watching their space chess match.

                Some interesting trivia the line that the Romulan Commander says to Kirk when tells they are two of the same kind, “In a different reality I may have called you friend.” In the major Superman comic book revamp The Man of Steel (1986) writer John Byrne—who also wrote Star Trek comics—recycles that line as a thought Batman has about Superman in issue #3.  The difference was in the aftermath of Crisis on Infinite Earths Superman and Batman had their histories altered.  Where Batman did once call Superman “friend” in another reality, the Pre-Crisis universe, in the Post-Crisis universe the two were more like professional acquaintances. 

                I wish all Star Trek writers had to watch this episode before writing anything about cloaking.  Often writers seem to forget that invisible does not mean intangible.  I love how the Enterprise responds to their invisibility by just firing randomly into space like they are playing the board game Battleship. “Well they are out here somewhere!”  Too often in modern Star Trek we’ll see the crew be like “Oh, they disappeared.  I guess they got away.”

                The episode was a great way to introduce these classic Star Trek villains: The Romulans.  A society of Vulcans based on the values of the Roman Empire as opposed to the values of Suark.  This episode would pave the way for many more great appearances of these adversaries.  No Romulan character that follows however matches the Romulan Commander from this episode and if I were to cite this episode an error it is in not giving him a name.

FINAL GRADE  5 of 5