This is the first entry being written immediately following the show, so there's that.
Alright, so this is the second pilot, and it's interesting seeing Kirk, Spock, Sulu and Scotty admist an entirely different crew otherwise. The Enterprise is exploring near the edge of the galaxy when they come across a black box belonging to the SS Valiant, lost 200 years prior. Apparently, they hit a magnetic storm, frantically searched for information on extrasensory perception (ESP), and then the captain forced the ship to self-destruct.
The Enterprise then hits the same energy field, leaving the ship's warp drives damaged (meaning it's now several years to the nearest planet, instead of a few days), several crewmembers dead and a couple injured. Helmsman Gary Mitchell is knocked unconscious, along with the ship's new psychiatrist, and when the helmsman awakens, he finds he has psionic powers that allow him to do things like mentally control the ship's electronics and read minds.
His powers continue to increase, and he begins to threaten to the crew. Kirk reluctantly decides to abandon him on an empty planet with only an unmanned, automated mining facility, and hopes to find what they need to repair the ship. Mitchell telepathically kills a crewmember and friend, then escapes from the facility, bringing the sympathetic psychiatrist with him.
Kirk follows him with a phaser rifle, only to be forced to his knees to "pray" to Mitchell, who declares himself a god and has prepared a grave for the captain. The doctor's own psionic powers begin to awaken, and as Kirk appeals to her remaining humanity, she and Mitchell begin trading telepathic blows. With Mitchell weakened, Kirk knocks him into the grave, recovers his phaser rifle, and blasts the nearby rock, which covers Mitchell and the grave. The psychiatrist dies of her wounds, and Kirk beams back to the ship.
Kirk reports that Mitchell and the doctor both gave their lives "in performance of their duty", and laments that Mitchell didn't ask for what happened to him and so should be remembered as a good man and soldier. Spock expresses sympathy, and Kirk notes, with a smile, "I believe there's some hope for you after all, Mister Spock."
Another one that was a little telegraphed, but enjoyable. Star Trek definitely doesn't shy away from moral gray areas. Kirk struggles with how to deal with a man he's known for fifteen years who has suddenly become a danger to everyone on board, while Spock emotionlessly tells him to kill him or strand him, much to Kirk's frustration. At the end, we see a hint of how their relationship will develop.
With both pilots done, now we can move forward in normal order! Not sure why this one was bumped to episode 4 on the list; it has only a portion of the full crew, and takes place a year before the series begins. But whatever! We have Kirk, we have Spock, and I'm ready to rock!
Thursday, August 7, 2014
The Man Trap (August 5th, 2014)
I learned after the fact that "The Man Trap", despite appearing as episode 2 on Netflix, is actually not the first chronologically. "Where No Man Has Gone Before" is the second pilot of the series, and features Kirk, Scotty and Sulu, along with other players who weren't in the pilot or graduated to the full show.
But that was after the fact, so here's "The Man Trap"!
Alright, now this is the crew I'm familiar with!
The Enterprise arrives at planet M-113 for the routine medical exams of a scientist, Professor Crater, and his wife, Nancy, who also happens to be Dr. McCoys lost love. From the start, we knew something is up with her: she acts strangely, and the three crewmembers who look at her all see someone different. Meanwhile, several references are made to the scientist couples' need of more salt. Shortly afterward, the first redshirt of the series is found dead (okay, he was in blue, but still!) with weird circle marks on his face, and McCoy utters, "He's dead, Jim."
Yep, definitely to the Trek I'm more familiar with.
It turns out Nancy is a shape-shifting alien, the last of her kind, and she needs salt to survive. "Nancy" manages to make it aboard the Enterprise by impersonating another dead crewmember after they beam to the planet to take the doctor and his wife to the ship for care. The alien eventually dons the guise of McCoy himself.
Meanwhile, Kirk and Spock find Crater, and after stunning him, he tells the whole story: his wife Nancy was killed a year ago by the alien, who now appears to him as Nancy out of affection for him. Back on the ship, "McCoy" wants to spare the creature when they find it, but Crater is refusing to tell the crew how to locate it. After "McCoy" takes Crater to sick bay to administer truth serum, an alert goes off from the area. Kirk arrives to find Crater dead, same mottling as the other deceased, but an injured Spock has survived, compliments of his different Vulcan blood.
"McCoy" becomes "Nancy" again and goes to the real McCoy (heh, heh), asking for help. Kirk arrives with a phaser and some salt, trying to tempt the creature, but McCoy stops Kirk from shooting. The creature stuns Kirk, and then, when Spock arrives, "Nancy" subdues him as well. Reverting to it's natural form (a green, alient, plantlike normal form with suction-cup-looking hands), it moves to feed on Kirk, and McCoy finally steels his resolve and kills it.
It might be ironic, but despite being the first one with the actual cast that I've watched, I actually liked The Cage better. Maybe it's years of watching/reading/playing Twin Peaks, Forbidden Planet, X-Files and other assorted sci-fi/horror, but the plot twist was telegraphed early into the show. I didn't feel like it really projected the depth of McCoy's feelings for Nancy, either, making his indecision at the end as the creature beats on his friends feel a little forced.
Still, not a bad start. On to the original pilot...!
But that was after the fact, so here's "The Man Trap"!
Alright, now this is the crew I'm familiar with!
The Enterprise arrives at planet M-113 for the routine medical exams of a scientist, Professor Crater, and his wife, Nancy, who also happens to be Dr. McCoys lost love. From the start, we knew something is up with her: she acts strangely, and the three crewmembers who look at her all see someone different. Meanwhile, several references are made to the scientist couples' need of more salt. Shortly afterward, the first redshirt of the series is found dead (okay, he was in blue, but still!) with weird circle marks on his face, and McCoy utters, "He's dead, Jim."
Yep, definitely to the Trek I'm more familiar with.
It turns out Nancy is a shape-shifting alien, the last of her kind, and she needs salt to survive. "Nancy" manages to make it aboard the Enterprise by impersonating another dead crewmember after they beam to the planet to take the doctor and his wife to the ship for care. The alien eventually dons the guise of McCoy himself.
Meanwhile, Kirk and Spock find Crater, and after stunning him, he tells the whole story: his wife Nancy was killed a year ago by the alien, who now appears to him as Nancy out of affection for him. Back on the ship, "McCoy" wants to spare the creature when they find it, but Crater is refusing to tell the crew how to locate it. After "McCoy" takes Crater to sick bay to administer truth serum, an alert goes off from the area. Kirk arrives to find Crater dead, same mottling as the other deceased, but an injured Spock has survived, compliments of his different Vulcan blood.
"McCoy" becomes "Nancy" again and goes to the real McCoy (heh, heh), asking for help. Kirk arrives with a phaser and some salt, trying to tempt the creature, but McCoy stops Kirk from shooting. The creature stuns Kirk, and then, when Spock arrives, "Nancy" subdues him as well. Reverting to it's natural form (a green, alient, plantlike normal form with suction-cup-looking hands), it moves to feed on Kirk, and McCoy finally steels his resolve and kills it.
It might be ironic, but despite being the first one with the actual cast that I've watched, I actually liked The Cage better. Maybe it's years of watching/reading/playing Twin Peaks, Forbidden Planet, X-Files and other assorted sci-fi/horror, but the plot twist was telegraphed early into the show. I didn't feel like it really projected the depth of McCoy's feelings for Nancy, either, making his indecision at the end as the creature beats on his friends feel a little forced.
Still, not a bad start. On to the original pilot...!
The Cage (July 24th, 2014)
So, the original pilot with basically nobody I'm familiar with besides Spock. One of the few episodes I've seen of classic Trek was the follow-up to this one, and it makes a lot more sense now that I've seen the original.
Part of my desire to watch the original Star Trek is based upon notalgia: my parents being early Trekkies, and the few original-cast movies I saw as a youngster, and starting with The Cage almost goes against that. The cast is entirely different, except for Leonard Nimoy, which is in itself funny because the Spock character hasn't yet fully developed.
Anyway, so they follow a distress call and beam down onto the planet Talos IV: it supports life, to their surprise I laughed out loud when he and Pike stumble across life on the new planet, and he and Spock share a horribly goofy grin when they find a particularly pretty flower!). Soon they're confronted with a beautiful young woman, who lures Pike into the clutches of the natives: Talosians, who are short, pale guys with huge heads that throb with each pulse.
As it turns out, their civilization is dying, along with their planet. They need a suitable species that they can breed as slaves to help repopulate and restore life to the planet, and conveniently have a woman, Vina; inconveniently, they lack a man, and that's where Pike comes in. They can create illusions with their minds, and try to tempt the good captain by promising him perceived riches, women, and luxury. Whatever he wants, they can make him believe he has.
Meanwhile, using their illusions, they thwart ever attempt of the Enterprise's crew to save their leader.
When Pike rebukes the advances of Vina, the aliens capture two women from the crew: the cool, collected first mate and the young, new yeoman on the ship, promising a superior mind and intelligent children with the first officer, and "strong female drives" in the yeoman (!).
Around this time, Pike realizes the Talosians can't read his mind when it comes to primitive emotions (primal anger, for example), and they manage to escape to the surface. Meanwhile, the Talosians realize, by reading the Enterprise's databanks, realize humans can be violent and hateful, and they would prefer death to captivity, even "pleasant and benevolent" captivity, and so decide that humans will not work for their plans.
As it turns out, Vina was horribly injured when the expedition she was a part of crash-landed on Talos IV. The Talosians rebuilt her, but without knowing what a human looks like, made her horribly disfigured, and so she opts to stay on Talos IV, where she has the illusion of looking like a normal human, and Talosians give her an illusion of being with Captain Pike as well.
Back on the ship, Yeoman Colt puts her "strong female drives" to work, and asks Pike who he would have picked to have been "Eve" to his Adam on Talos IV; the question is left unanswered as she is chased off the bridge by the first officer.
The pilot was apparently criticized by studio heads for being "too cerebral", but I thought it was pretty intriguing in a good way. Pike's battle against illusions, trying to discern reality from fiction, was interesting, and even more interesting was the assertion by the Talosians that humans prefer violent freedom to captivity that was full of pleasure.
The network also found it a little slow. I can maybe agree with that. IIRC, it clocked in at over an hour, and probably could have trimmed a good chunk off that.
I can see elements of the full series developing: Pike is not unlike Kirk: quick, decisive, and intelligent, and he had a good look. It makes me wonder what would have happened if he had decided to continue with the show (in hindsight, seems like walking away, especially with a career in trouble, was not the best move). I think he could have pulled it off.
Laurel Goodwin was incredibly cute. I would have liked to see her transition to the regular cast, but apparently, "The Cage" takes place fifteen years before the original series kicks in, so I guess that would have been hard to write in! I guess she's in one of the offshoot comic books or something, but thankfully, the expanded universe/apocrypha does not seem to be canon. It's so hard to follow that sort of stuff, and I'm already cringing at Disney making everything from here on out canon in the Star Wars universe. Yuck.
As a general comment, the HD upgrades do look pretty nice. I would like to see the original images of outside the ship, but so it goes. The trade-off is that we get a very nice, crisp picture during the rest of the scenes. Most of the other effects are untouched, I'm guessing, because the phasers and force fields look very 1960s.
An interesting start to the series. It's almost like watching it's own unique beast: like The Next Generation after it, it clearly takes place in the same universe, but it's not quite Star Trek yet (or rather, "Star Trek: The Original Series" as it seems to have been dubbed). Looking forward to moving forward!
Part of my desire to watch the original Star Trek is based upon notalgia: my parents being early Trekkies, and the few original-cast movies I saw as a youngster, and starting with The Cage almost goes against that. The cast is entirely different, except for Leonard Nimoy, which is in itself funny because the Spock character hasn't yet fully developed.
Anyway, so they follow a distress call and beam down onto the planet Talos IV: it supports life, to their surprise I laughed out loud when he and Pike stumble across life on the new planet, and he and Spock share a horribly goofy grin when they find a particularly pretty flower!). Soon they're confronted with a beautiful young woman, who lures Pike into the clutches of the natives: Talosians, who are short, pale guys with huge heads that throb with each pulse.
As it turns out, their civilization is dying, along with their planet. They need a suitable species that they can breed as slaves to help repopulate and restore life to the planet, and conveniently have a woman, Vina; inconveniently, they lack a man, and that's where Pike comes in. They can create illusions with their minds, and try to tempt the good captain by promising him perceived riches, women, and luxury. Whatever he wants, they can make him believe he has.
Meanwhile, using their illusions, they thwart ever attempt of the Enterprise's crew to save their leader.
When Pike rebukes the advances of Vina, the aliens capture two women from the crew: the cool, collected first mate and the young, new yeoman on the ship, promising a superior mind and intelligent children with the first officer, and "strong female drives" in the yeoman (!).
Around this time, Pike realizes the Talosians can't read his mind when it comes to primitive emotions (primal anger, for example), and they manage to escape to the surface. Meanwhile, the Talosians realize, by reading the Enterprise's databanks, realize humans can be violent and hateful, and they would prefer death to captivity, even "pleasant and benevolent" captivity, and so decide that humans will not work for their plans.
As it turns out, Vina was horribly injured when the expedition she was a part of crash-landed on Talos IV. The Talosians rebuilt her, but without knowing what a human looks like, made her horribly disfigured, and so she opts to stay on Talos IV, where she has the illusion of looking like a normal human, and Talosians give her an illusion of being with Captain Pike as well.
Back on the ship, Yeoman Colt puts her "strong female drives" to work, and asks Pike who he would have picked to have been "Eve" to his Adam on Talos IV; the question is left unanswered as she is chased off the bridge by the first officer.
The pilot was apparently criticized by studio heads for being "too cerebral", but I thought it was pretty intriguing in a good way. Pike's battle against illusions, trying to discern reality from fiction, was interesting, and even more interesting was the assertion by the Talosians that humans prefer violent freedom to captivity that was full of pleasure.
The network also found it a little slow. I can maybe agree with that. IIRC, it clocked in at over an hour, and probably could have trimmed a good chunk off that.
I can see elements of the full series developing: Pike is not unlike Kirk: quick, decisive, and intelligent, and he had a good look. It makes me wonder what would have happened if he had decided to continue with the show (in hindsight, seems like walking away, especially with a career in trouble, was not the best move). I think he could have pulled it off.
Laurel Goodwin was incredibly cute. I would have liked to see her transition to the regular cast, but apparently, "The Cage" takes place fifteen years before the original series kicks in, so I guess that would have been hard to write in! I guess she's in one of the offshoot comic books or something, but thankfully, the expanded universe/apocrypha does not seem to be canon. It's so hard to follow that sort of stuff, and I'm already cringing at Disney making everything from here on out canon in the Star Wars universe. Yuck.
As a general comment, the HD upgrades do look pretty nice. I would like to see the original images of outside the ship, but so it goes. The trade-off is that we get a very nice, crisp picture during the rest of the scenes. Most of the other effects are untouched, I'm guessing, because the phasers and force fields look very 1960s.
An interesting start to the series. It's almost like watching it's own unique beast: like The Next Generation after it, it clearly takes place in the same universe, but it's not quite Star Trek yet (or rather, "Star Trek: The Original Series" as it seems to have been dubbed). Looking forward to moving forward!
Introduction
A quick little introduction to this blog, just in case someone stumbles across it sometime. It's just a personal journal recording my thoughts as I go through and slowly watch the original run of Star Trek.
My previous Star Trek experience is somewhat limited. My parents were classic Trekkies, but I never saw much; they had grown out of it by the time I was old enough to be interested. I've seen several of the movies: the original five I saw years ago, probably the early to mid 90s. Later, I added Generations and First Contact to that list. A few scattered episodes of Next Generation made their way into that, and I actually watched the pilot for Deep Space 9 (I want to say I saw it on a Saturday; maybe it was a repeat of the next week after it's original Sunday showing).
I have opinions on all of those, but I'll get to that later, maybe.
More recently, I saw Star Trek VI (with the Rifftrax treatment) and Star Trek (2009), and maybe two or three episodes of classic Trek on one of those odd-numbered, free-TV stations that shows old programming (but then they moved the time, I think earlier, making it overlap with WWE Smackdown, and so I missed out after that!), and I picked up a couple of those compilation DVDs that I may have watched an episode or two on.
My other experience is with pop culture and internet memes. Picard facepalming, "KAAAAAAHN!" and Shatner's often-joked-about delivery, backstage drama with Shatner, and Takei's sudden, slightly obnoxious presence on the internet.
In short: I'm going into watching the original three seasons somewhat blind, and with no timetables. As of this writing, I'm three episodes into it, and planning to do a blog each episode, both for prosperity and just to keep working those writing muscles. Here goes!
My previous Star Trek experience is somewhat limited. My parents were classic Trekkies, but I never saw much; they had grown out of it by the time I was old enough to be interested. I've seen several of the movies: the original five I saw years ago, probably the early to mid 90s. Later, I added Generations and First Contact to that list. A few scattered episodes of Next Generation made their way into that, and I actually watched the pilot for Deep Space 9 (I want to say I saw it on a Saturday; maybe it was a repeat of the next week after it's original Sunday showing).
I have opinions on all of those, but I'll get to that later, maybe.
More recently, I saw Star Trek VI (with the Rifftrax treatment) and Star Trek (2009), and maybe two or three episodes of classic Trek on one of those odd-numbered, free-TV stations that shows old programming (but then they moved the time, I think earlier, making it overlap with WWE Smackdown, and so I missed out after that!), and I picked up a couple of those compilation DVDs that I may have watched an episode or two on.
My other experience is with pop culture and internet memes. Picard facepalming, "KAAAAAAHN!" and Shatner's often-joked-about delivery, backstage drama with Shatner, and Takei's sudden, slightly obnoxious presence on the internet.
In short: I'm going into watching the original three seasons somewhat blind, and with no timetables. As of this writing, I'm three episodes into it, and planning to do a blog each episode, both for prosperity and just to keep working those writing muscles. Here goes!
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