THE BEST EPISODE TITLE EVER

 

Episode Title:  For The World is Hollow and I Have Touched The Sky

Air Date: 11/8/1968

Written by Rik Vollaerts

Directed by Tony Leader

Cast: William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk    Leonard Nimoy as Commander Spock             DeForest Kelley as Dr. Leonard H. McCoy AKA “Bones”              James Doohan  as Lieutenant Commander Montgomery Scott AKA “Scotty”        George Takei  as Lieutenant  Hikaru Sulu              Nichelle Nichols as Lieutenant Nyota Uhura          Frank da Vinci as Lieutenant Brent     Walter Koenig as Ensign Pavel Chekov                 Majel Barrett as Nurse Christine Chapel      Jeannie Malone as Fabrini Servant         Byron Morrow as Admiral Westervliet         Katherine Woodville as Natira     Jon Lormer as Old Man        

Ships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, Yonada

Planets:  none

My Spoiler filled summary and review: The episode starts right out running when the Enterprise is attacked by some atomic space missiles.  It is not much of crisis as the ship’s phasers take care of it quite nicely.  Kirk orders Chekov to tract where those warheads came from when he is called down to sickbay.  McCoy then gives Kirk the bad news that that upon examining himself he discovered he has xenopolycythenia and the condition is terminal.  Dr. McCoy only has a few months to live.

The Enterprise meets Yonada

They trace the source of the attack to an asteroid however after some observation with the ship’s sensors they discover that what they are seeing isn’t an asteroid but a spaceship that seems to be abandoned.  The real bad news is given its present course it is going to crash into the Federation colony Daran V.  They would rather not destroy it so Kirk decides to beam over with Mr. Spock and, after a request, Dr. McCoy to see if they can stop it. 

Both a bad fighter and a bad dresser!

Well, it turns out the place isn’t abandoned after all the people were just hiding underground.  Also, what is strange is this ship’s insides are made to appear as if they were on a planet.  The away team is able to fight off their attackers, Captain Kirk is one of the greatest fighters in the galaxy and the three do well, but fight ends as Natira calls it off.  Natira explains that she is the high priestess of her world which is named Yonada.  She invites her new guests down to meet the Oracle, which is their leader.  The Oracle is an AI who doesn’t realize how much of a threat it is in if it wishes to go against Captain Kirk.  In order to show their new guests what would happen if they took up against Yonada it zaps them unconscious. 

Kirk and Spock wake up first.  Spock wonders what is taking the good Doctor so long to awaken.  Kirk then confides in Spock about McCoy’s condition.  McCoy wakes up but before they can have any serious discussion a familiar looking old man walks in the room.  He gives the guests some herbs.  At which point Kirk starts to ask the man about the nature of their planet.  The man confesses that he has at times been curious about it.  Once in his youth, he climbed the tallest hill in Yonada an action that is forbidden by the Oracle.  The man started to feel pain then returned to his story.  He tells them that he discovered “the world is hollow and I have touched sky!” With that he drops down dead.  It turns out that those in Yonada have an implant that ensures obedience and if they ignore their warning signs it kills them. 

Natira appears after the death of the old man and explains things to them.  She takes a strong liking to Dr. McCoy and he to her.  Here Captain Kirk sees an opportunity.  He doesn’t know why Natira doesn’t have the hots for himself, as the women on this show naturally do, and instead has them for McCoy, as women on this show normally don’t.   However, Kirk sees the opportunity of a distraction, while McCoy is being entertained by Narita, he and Spock plan to get into the Oracle room and see what they can find. 

Yonadians being more friendly

McCoy and Natira are hitting it off extremely well and McCoy even tells her of his condition to which she responds with her intention love him as long as they have together.  She is so excited that she goes to the Oracle to ask for permission to marry him.  The Oracle says so long as McCoy agrees to all their rules and gets the implant, he is good.  However, by turning on the Oracle it senses the intruders and beings to blast them.  McCoy realizing that his friends are about to be put to death he tells Natira that he wants to stay but the only way he can do that is if he knows his friends are alright.  She agrees and will send them back.  McCoy tells the Captain he is staying.  With McCoy certainly only with months left and the people of Yonada maybe with only months left, Kirk agrees to let him stay as he and Spock return to the ship.

The Oracle!

Kirk receives orders from Admiral Westervliet that the Enterprise is being reassigned and that another Starfleet starship will take over.  On Yonada, McCoy learns of a book that contains all of the society’s secrets.  Realizing there is now a way to save his new world, as soon as his new wife leaves him alone, he contacts the ship.  Kirk and Spock quickly return but McCoy is punished by his implant and it nearly kills him for giving the information to Spock.  Spock saves him by simply removing the implant.  

Natira

Natira walks in on them and Kirk confronts her with the truth.  She rejects it but an idea is taking root in her brain.  She goes to the Oracle and confronts it with what she knows.  The Oracle is angry that she is questioning it and begins to kill her. Spock and Kirk show up however and save her the same way they did McCoy. 

McCoy finding his love

Oracle tries to kill them by baking them alive but using the book McCoy told them about they are able to take control of the ship and shut the Oracle down.  As an added bonus they discover the cure to Dr. McCoy’s condition that is stored in Yonada’s databanks.  With McCoy recovered and the truth of Yonada reveled to their people, Natria realizing her place is helping her people live their lives in truth and Dr. McCoy’s place is with the Enterprise.  With that she lets her husband go and he goes to return to his ship.  On board Kirk let’s him know that it will be possible for the Enterprise to return later this year, to see how they are doing.  This would allow McCoy to be with Natria again.

Additional thoughts: This episode hit a little too close to home for me.  In this episode a dying Dr. McCoy meets a woman who loves him for all his flaws and even though he had enjoyed his time on the Enterprise there is still a certain type of loneliness that he experiences that she ends.  The two understand each other and he is happy.  McCoy even gets inspired to search for a cure to his condition.  When he is finally cured and the planetary crisis is averted, Natria has an epiphany and shows him the door.  Well, that was a lot like my summer.  I meet someone and she was like me a bit socially awkward but willing to meet people.  We had a lot in common, large families, and desire to form our own.  A number of similar interests and differences to grow on.  We talked everyday online for over a month and went on a few dates and officially became an item.  Then one day in the middle of an IM chat she suddenly says that since no one had ever been romantically interested in her, she was just so amazed meet someone who was that she didn’t think about if she were truly that into me or not.  She decided that she wasn’t and broke it off all the while explaining I had done nothing wrong.  I was so depressed I didn’t leave my house for two days.  During that time, I watched this episode to review it, at the time I was just glad I had already reviewed A City on the Edge of Forever, but I wasn’t prepared for the emotional impact.  When it rains, it pours. 

True love!

So why did Kirk have to send to Starfleet for a new CMO?  Isn’t there any doctors on McCoy’s staff who could take over?  What about Dr. Joseph M'Benga?  He is plenty capable. When did we last see him? I just feel this should be an in-house promotion for the stake of the ship.  Someone should find Dr. M’Benga.

Learning about each other!

Well after all the episodes where they are the “only ship in the quadrant” it turns out Starfleet has some ships to put on this problem and no longer needs the Enterprise.  Where were they when the Enterprise was half broke down fighting an asteroid for months.  The one time they get relief from Starfleet is the one time they don’t want it.

Like almost every critic who has ever reviewed this episode I find myself wondering why it was exactly the founder of Yonada thought it necessary to trick their descendants into thinking they were on a planet when it was actually a starship.  What was the purpose?  Wouldn’t it be better to let them know where they were going so, they could better prepare?  I mean I understand why you make your ship look like a planet, after all you want those who would have to spend their entire lives there to be comfortable.   I also don’t understand people smart enough to build a ship like this would design such ugly hats for their people.

Poor guy he just wanted the truth!

What luck it was that Spock was able to just pick the cure right out of their databanks. One would think when righting the direction of a starship probing for unknown cures might have been the farthest from one’s mind.  Mr. Spock however is a multitasker. 

FINAL GRADE 4 of 5

THE CAPTAIN HAS DISAPPEARED

Episode Title:  The Tholian Web

Air Date: 11/15/1968

Written by Judy Burns and Chet Richards

Directed by Herb Wallerstein

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

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

Planets:  none

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

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

Ship is in a bad state!

Not good!

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

Trying to save Captain Kirk!

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

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

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

A visit from a ghost!

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

Kirk pep talking from the grave!

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

Three toast with a cure!

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

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

A reflective trio of Starfleet officers

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

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

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

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

Tholians taking a punch!

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

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

FINAL GRADE 5 of 5

SHE FEELS TOO MUCH!

 

Episode Title:  The Empath

Air Date: 12/6/1968

Written by Joyce Muskat

Directed by John Erman

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

Ships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701

Planets:  Minara II

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

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

Finding Gem underground!

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

Two really weird guys!

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

Humans used in science experiments!

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

Kirk's shirtless torture scenes

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

McCoy's self-sacrifice 

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

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

McCoy returned from being tortured!

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

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

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

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

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

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

FINAL GRADE 3 of 5

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

 

Episode Title:  Is There in Truth No Beauty?

Air Date: 10/18/1968

Written by Jean Lisette Aroeste

Directed by Ralph Senensky

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

Ships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, unnamed Medusan vessel

Planets:  unnamed planet

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

Dr. Miranda Jones

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

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

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

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

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

Spock and Jones discuss telepathy

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

Kirk trying to flatter Dr. Jones

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

Kollos as Spock!

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

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

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

FINAL GRADE 2 of 5