...and so, as with my reviews of the first two seasons (linked here and here), here are my thoughts on the third season episodes, after watching them while exercising every day. As you will see, there was, unfortunately, a marked turn down in quality; yet there are still some great episodes mixed in here, and even some of the lesser episodes were still a bit of harmless fun. This season certainly had it's share of average or below average episodes, but notice how I don't grade anything as "F", like I did with the first season episode "The Alternative Factor". Once again, the main characters here are William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk, Leonard Nimoy as the Vulcan science officer Mr. Spock, DeForest Kelley as the irascible Dr. McCoy, James Doohan as Scotty, Nichelle Nichols as Lt. Uhura, George Takei as Sulu, Walter Koenig as Chekov, and Majel Barrett as Nurse Chapel.
Spock’s
Brain
Grade:
D+
Oh
my gosh! This is generally considered to
be the worst episode of the original series, and with good reason! However, like Ed Wood’s films, it enters into
the realm of being so bad, it’s good!
A space cutie in go-go boots pops aboard the Enterprise, pushes a button
on her belt to knock everyone out (Nurse Chapel falls the best!), and then
steals Spock’s brain! The rest of the
episode is like Spock here: A brainless
shell. McCoy rigs him up like a remote
control toy robot to take him along, and on the planet, Kirk, McCoy, and Scotty
find the cuties are, like the script, devoid of intelligence, but they gain
massive, though temporary, IQ points through a machine that looks like a funky,
space-aged hair dryer. McCoy uses it to
put Spock’s brain back. Sulu, Uhura, and
Chekov do fairly well with more, albeit ridiculous, dialogue; too bad it’s in
this absurd episode! Strangely, the plot
of the successful movie Star Trek III:
The Search for Spock is strikingly similar, with the crew trying to bring
Spock’s body and brain back together.
The
Enterprise Incident
Grade:
A
Once
again, the best follows the worst.
Captain Kirk is insane! Spock is
a traitor! They are taken prisoner by
the Romulans! Spock kills the
Captain! Ever wonder what the crew would
be like on an espionage mission? Wonder
no more! It’s all a ploy so that
Starfleet can get its hands on a Romulan cloaking device, and the female
Romulan Commander (Joanne Linville), who has a thing for Spock, gets caught in
the middle of it all. Before the end, Kirk
is surgically altered to look like a Romulan, steals the cloaking device and
tries to save Spock, who has been placed under arrest! This was an entertaining episode with a lot
of fun twists! All the other regulars –
McCoy, Scotty, Uhura, Chekov, Sulu, and Chapel – get some nice character
moments, including Kirk reprimanding Chekov, Uhura chastising Dr. McCoy, and
Chapel has the life scared out of her when the supposedly dead captain opens
his eyes.
The
Paradise Syndrome
Grade:
B
This
human drama is only slightly ruined by a few cheesy production values and some
of the acting. Shatner overacts when
Kirk loses his memory and is stranded on a planet where a group of American
Indians, abducted from earth hundreds of years ago by aliens, live a peaceful existence. Coming from within an alien temple, the
people, led by Chief Goro (Richard Hale), think Kirk is a god. Kirk, now named Kirok, manages to bag a babe
again – the very well endowed Miramanee, played by Sabrina Scharf – but this
time, he marries her and she becomes pregnant with his child, causing another
Indian, Salish (Rudy Solari), to become jealous. Meanwhile, Spock must figure out a way to
save not only the captain but the entire planet from an asteroid on a collision
course, and Dr. McCoy butts heads with him the whole way, with Scotty worrying
over his engines (“My poor bairns!”).
Sulu, Chekov, Uhura, and Chapel do their jobs. Of course, being episodic television, neither
Miramanee nor Kirk’s unborn child survive.
And
the Children Shall Lead
Grade:
D
More
proof that children and Star Trek aren’t really a good mix. Five children, lead by the oldest Tommy
Starns (Craig Hundley) are the only survivors of an expedition in which all
their parents are inexplicably dead, and the children aren’t grieving. Once on the Enterprise, the children get ice
cream from Nurse Chapel, but it isn’t long before an alien presence known as
“Gorgan” (famed lawyer Melvin Belli) is revealed as an evil entity tricking the
children and giving them alien powers of illusion to control the crew,
including Sulu, Uhura (who sees her own death), Leslie, and temporarily, Kirk
and Spock. The two singlehandedly resist
their influence, fight the crew (including Scotty and Chekov) and reveal the
Gorgan for what he truly is. In the end,
McCoy is elated over the sound of crying, devastated children! There are shades of better episodes and a few
believable performances (particularly Pamelyn Ferdin as young Mary). Unfortunately, the writing sunk it.
Is
There in Truth No Beauty?
Grade:
B
There
were some interesting concepts in this episode, which introduces a very alien
race known as Medusans, creatures that have the most sublime minds in the
galaxy, but whose non-corporeal appearance is so ugly that it drives men insane
at the sight of them. The Medusan
ambassador Kollos travels in a box, like a small pet kennel! The plot centers on Dr. Miranda Jones, a
powerful human telepath and Kollos’ consort, and it was Diana Muldaur’s second
appearance. A former lover, Larry
Marvick (David Frankham), has plans to kill Kollos, and is driven insane after
looking at him. There is also an ugly
rivalry between Miranda and Spock that puts the Vulcan’s life in great
danger. Kirk must make Miranda see the
ugliness within herself in order to save Spock.
The big reveal: Miranda is
actually blind, using sensors on her dress to appear sighted (shades of Geordi’s
VISOR). It is also revealed that Uhura’s
name means “freedom”. Scotty and McCoy
get into the action a bit.
Specter
of the Gun
Grade:
A
How to make a shoe-string budget work for you! This was a fascinating and surreal western adventure!
Aliens called Melkotians warn the ship and crew not to enter their
space. When Kirk attempts peaceful
negotiations, the Melkotians, who are experts in the power of illusion, place
Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scotty, and Chekov in a dreamlike, unfinished recreation of
the famous battle of the OK corral, and the quintet are seen by the townspeople
as the losing Clantons against the brutal Earp brothers and Doc Holliday,
played by Ron Soble, Charles Maxwell, Rex Holman, and Sam Gilman. Chekov gets the girl this time, a southern
belle named Sylvia (Bonnie Beecher).
After Chekov is supposedly killed by Wyatt, the other four must figure a
way out of this unreal, old west gunfight.
Spock holds the key to their safety: He knows it is unreal, therefore,
the bullets cannot harm him. Now the others
must be as certain as he is!
Day
of the Dove
Grade:
A
The
best Klingon episode of the original series!
An alien entity that feeds off of negative emotions and hatred sets into
motion a series of events to create animosity and hatred between the crew of
the Enterprise and a group of captured Klingons onboard the ship. Michael Ansara is great as Kang, the Klingon
leader, including his wife Mara (Susan Howard), the first Klingon female in Star Trek. Kirk must figure out a way to stop the sudden
hostility to make the alien go away.
Along the way, the entire crew is affected by the hatred, including all
the primaries: Kirk loses his cool a few
times, McCoy flies off the handle, Uhura takes her frustration out on her
communications station, Spock and Scotty are at each other’s throats, and
Chekov creates a fictional brother Pieter the Klingons killed in order to seek
revenge against them, at one point getting rather forceful with a captured
Mara. Surprisingly, Sulu keeps his cool
organizing teams and trying to fix life support. Lt. Johnson (David L. Ross) is a crewmember
who is wounded but wants to continue fighting the Klingons.
For
the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky
Grade:
C-
McCoy
gets the girl this time… and it’s not believable for a second! McCoy is diagnosed with a fatal, incurable
illness (Nurse Chapel is understandably upset) and the Enterprise is dispatched
to stop an asteroid from smashing into a very populated planet. They discover the asteroid is actually a
multi-generational spaceship, and all the aliens onboard, the Yonadans, think it
is a stationary planet. They are under
the forced obedience of a computer called The Oracle (voiced by Doohan) and
suffer pain and possibly death if they ask too many questions or doubt the Oracle. The leader of the Yonadans, Natira, played by
Katherine Woodville, falls instantly in love with Dr. McCoy, and McCoy agrees
to have a torture device placed in his head and to worship the Oracle after
spending a few minutes with Natira! The
show centers around Kirk, Spock, and McCoy in the landing party, and Natira and
the Oracle. Everyone else is window
dressing, including the old man (Jon Lormer) who dies when he admits to the
strangers the episode’s long title.
Other than that, with the exception of Natira, the Yonada people wear
funny-looking costumes. This one was, to
quote Spock, “Most illogical.”
The
Tholian Web
Grade: B+
This
one allowed all the main characters a lot to do, and the pacing was kept
brisk. Kirk is lost along with the starship
Defiant when it slips into another universe.
While trying to get the Captain back, the crew begins suffering from
space madness due to the area of space they are in, and to make matters worse,
aliens called Tholians are creating a web to trap the Enterprise there for
good. Spock and McCoy are once again
fighting with each other throughout the incident with some great character
moments. Chekov is the first to go mad,
and Uhura is the first to see Captain Kirk trying to contact the ship from the
other universe. Sulu and Scotty are used
a lot as they do their jobs well, and even Chapel gets to save Dr. McCoy from
an insane lab tech. Exciting and fun
episode!
Plato’s
Stepchildren
Grade: B
This
was a rather interesting episode that takes the silliness factor to humiliating
levels for the sake of the story.
Leaving Scotty in command, Kirk, Spock, and McCoy investigate a distress
signal and find a group of 38 very long-lived aliens who idolize Plato, and
each possessing a tremendous psychokinetic power. The only one who doesn’t have this power is Michael
Dunn as the dwarf Alexander, who has become everyone else’s mistreated
servant. Wanting the doctor to stay, the
ruler Parmen (Liam Sullivan) and his vain wife Philana (Barbara Babcock) force
Kirk and Spock, and later Uhura and Nurse Chapel, into humiliating themselves,
manipulating them like live marionettes.
Spock sings! The landing party
figures out the Platonians got their power from eating the local foods, and Dr.
McCoy is able to whip up an injection that eventually gives Kirk the power to
oppose Parmen. This episode features
television’s first interracial kiss, between Kirk and Uhura, when Parmen forces
it upon them. This also reflects
Roddenberry’s futuristic vision as the dwarf Alexander was treated like dirt by
the evil Platonians, but is accepted by the enlightened Federation!
Wink
of an Eye
Grade:
C
This
episode is merely all right, although the idea of accelerated time is somewhat
interesting. Aliens called Skalosians suffer
from radiation poisoning; their water accelerates them, but also has, over
time, made them sterile, so they kidnap crewmembers of passing starships to use
as mates. One of the Skalosians, Kathie
Browne as Deela, chooses Kirk. The
foolish and mutinous crewman Compton (Geoffrey Binney), also accelerated,
suffers skin cell damage and dies almost immediately, showing Kirk the danger
he is in now that he is accelerated, especially since this small group’s
leader, Rael, played by Jason Evers, is jealous of Deela’s attraction to
Kirk. With a little help from an
accelerated recording from Kirk, Spock figures out what happened and must
quickly discover how to help the captain and stop the Skalosians. Although they have dialogue and a few
interesting moments, everyone else is relegated to walk-on status
here. Once again, the alien costumes are
a bit ridiculous, especially on the men!
The
Empath
Grade:
A-
Strange…
mysterious… minimalist… and fascinating!
Kirk, Spock, and McCoy find themselves abducted by aliens called Vians
(Alan Bergmann and Willard Sage), trapped in a large, darkened, underground
room like some weird, otherworldly theater stage with small circles of
light. There, they find a mute alien
woman they name Gem (a great silent performance by Kathryn Hays), an empath
with the power to feel what they feel, physically and emotionally, and with the
power to heal, though it drains her. The
three attempt to solve the mystery of why the Vians are torturing them, first
Kirk, then McCoy, and what Gem has to do with it. Eventually, with McCoy dying and Gem afraid
to save him, the Vians reveal that because their star system is collapsing,
they have the power to save only one planet.
The experiments were conducted to determine if Gem’s planet is the one
worth saving. In the end, she, and they,
display acts of self-sacrifice, compassion, and love. A very well written and thought-provoking
episode! Scotty has a bit to do in
command, but Sulu is merely a walk-on. Jason
Wingreen and Davis Roberts as Dr. Linke and Dr. Ozaba (quoting the Bible!) were
the first two abducted.
Elaan
of Troyius
Grade:
C+
A
somewhat entertaining episode, and the beginning is better than the ending,
despite a final space battle with a Klingon vessel. The Enterprise is ordered by Starfleet to
accompany the arrogant Dohlman of the planet Elasia to Troyius, the planet of
their current enemies, so that her arranged marriage to that planet’s ruler
will stop their interstellar war, and Kirk and his crew are caught in the
middle. France Nuyen as Elaan is an
arrogant pig of a woman who throws fits and actually stabs the ambassador from
Troyius (Jay Robinson as Petri). Uhura
gives up her quarters, which are not to Elaan’s satisfaction, and Kirk spends
his time teaching her manners. Trouble
arises when she cries and he touches her tears, which act like a super love
potion (of course!) and her character is not as colorful or as watchable later
as merely the object of Kirk’s obsession.
One of her party (Tony Young as Kryton) sabotages the Enterprise and
commits suicide, and the Klingons get involved.
Other than this, it’s mostly business as usual for the crew.
Whom
Gods Destroy
Grade:
C-
They
can’t all be great! While checking out
an insane asylum, Kirk and Spock are trapped by a former Starship Captain
“Lord” Garth (Steve Ihnat), who has the ability to appear as anyone. At various times, he takes on the guise of
Governor Cory (Keye Luke), Spock, and, several times, Kirk, once again allowing
Shatner to overact shamelessly. Scotty
and McCoy are left on the Enterprise wondering what to do. Yvonne Craig of Batgirl fame plays the
tragically unhinged Marta, a green Orion slave girl who is quite out of her
mind. Along with her species, seen only
once before, this is also the only other episode to feature a Tellerite and an
Andorian (alive), but they are merely Garth’s allies here and aren’t even given
any lines! Sulu and Uhura do their jobs. Steve Ihnat and Yvonne Craig are pretty good
here, but this is still rather forgettable.
Let
That Be Your Last Battlefield
Grade:
B-
Racism
and segregation are the name of this game.
Lokai (Lou Antonio) is a fugitive from the planet Cheron, and he is being
pursued by Bele (Frank Gorshin of The Riddler fame) from the same planet. To the crew, they are both white on one side
and black on the other. To them, the
difference is in which side is white and which side is black. Lokai, black on the left, fights for his
people’s freedom from slavery, and Bele, black on the right, has come to take
him back to Cheron as a political prisoner.
There are some good speeches about racism and a few tense moments as the
crew fights for control of the ship, including the first use of the ship’s
self-destruct sequence. Their fight
takes them to Cheron, which has been decimated, the only two left being Lokai
and Bele, and they take their fight to the planet, their hatred sealing their
fates. It is interesting that the show
takes a negative view of them both, the oppressor AND the oppressed, because of
their mutual hatred. The usual cast,
including Kirk and Spock, are basically secondary to the struggle between Lokai
and Bele. Oh, and Frank Gorshin runs
funny!
The
Mark of Gideon
Grade:
C-
The
explanation for an interesting teaser is actually laughable. While beaming down to Gideon, Kirk finds
himself on a duplicate of the Enterprise, alone with a mysterious woman named
Odona (Sharon Acker). Meanwhile, Spock
and the crew must deal with diplomats and bureaucrats from both the Federation
and Gideon, including David Hurst as the leader Hodin. It is eventually revealed that Gideon is
overpopulated, and they wanted to use Kirk’s recent injury to infect Odona,
Hodin’s daughter, to bring disease to their planet. However, this explanation only brings up more
questions, and the debate about Gideon’s ongoing problem is quite absurd, as is
their ultimately unnecessary recreation of the Enterprise. A bit eerie and haunting at times, the
episode is ultimately rather dull and slow moving, and though Odona is saved,
nothing is resolved in the end.
That
Which Survives
Grade:
C+
There
were a lot of notable characters in this one.
Kirk, McCoy, Sulu, and Arthur Batanides as geological specialist D’Amato
beam down to a mysterious planet and encounter a strange alien woman named
Losira (Lee Meriwether of Catwoman fame; Star
Trek season three certainly kept the Batman
regulars busy!), who seems to be a ghost.
Meanwhile, the Enterprise is hurled far away (Uhura and Spock are
bruised), and they must quickly get back to the planet to save the others. Losira shows up on the Enterprise, killing
the transporter ensign and Watkins (Kenneth Washington) with a mere touch, and Booker
Bradshaw as Dr. M’Benga (last seen in “A Private Little War”) must determine
what killed them. Things get dicey when
Scotty must affect repairs to the engines in a dangerous gamble, leaving Uhura
and Lt. Rahda at the helm (Naomi Pollack) sweating it out, but Spock remains
composed. On the planet, Losira kills
D’Amato, and tries to kill the others.
They eventually determine she is a “computer projection,” meaning a
hologram (Star Trek’s first!), protecting the planet against invaders and waiting
for a ship from her people that will, in fact, never come.
The
Lights of Zetar
Grade:
C+
Scotty
gets the girl this time, and it’s more believable than most other romances in
the third season. He’s got eyes for Jan
Shutan as Lt. Mira Romaine. The trouble
is, she is being invaded by the evil life force of the survivors of a dead
planet, Zetar. The Zetarians cause
trouble for the Enterprise and the Memory Alpha library outpost, where we see
the aftermath of their attack, including a dead Tellerite and Andorian. The crew attempt to fight them, but in the
end, they invade Mira and are driven out when the heroes put Mira in a
hyperbolic chamber and turn the pressure on.
Scotty and Mira have chemistry, and the rest of the cast basically do
their jobs and have discussions about their situation. Nurse Chapel gets to do Scotty’s accent this
time: “Well, with a bedside manner like
that, Scotty, you’rr in the Rrong biznez!”
Requiem
for Methuselah
Grade:
B-
Brahms,
da Vinci, Solomon, Alexander the Great, Lazarus, Methuselah, Merlin; this
episode postulates that the character of Flint (James Daly) is an immortal, and
was, at one time, all of these famous people, and 100 others! Of course, it all falls apart if you know
history at all. The show is about
Flint’s attempts to make the perfect woman, a robot named Rayna (Louise Sorel) who
will be as immortal as he is, and when Kirk, Spock, and McCoy invade Flint’s
solitude looking for an antidote to a devastating disease, they find an
uncooperative Flint, yet Flint encourages a romance between Kirk and Rayna,
which triggers her emotions for the first time.
In the end, she can’t choose between them, and it destroys her. The characters of Spock and McCoy are put to
good use, particularly the end where McCoy feels sorrier for Spock than he does
Kirk, and Spock helps Kirk to forget Rayna.
The rest of the crew - Scotty and Uhura and background extras - are
mostly window dressing.
The
Way to Eden
Grade:
D+
The
one with the space hippies, complete with cool hippie music (Charles Napier
sings!). The hippies are presented as a
religious cult rejecting technology and looking for Eden, led by the insane Dr.
Sevrin (Skip Homeier), a carrier of a deadly disease produced by
technology. One of them, Irina, played
by Mary Linda Rapelye, is an old flame of Chekov’s, and he starts to have
feelings for her again. Spock attempts
to “reach” them and jams with them while Dr. Sevrin takes over the ship! Chapel has a bad day because of them, and
when they use supersonic sound to knock everyone out, she falls the best again
(the same footage from “Spock’s Brain”).
Palmer (Elizabeth Rogers) replaces Uhura here. The hippies cross Romulan
space to reach Eden, which turns out to be a nightmare. Everything is acidic, and Adam (Napier) and
Sevrin both die eating the poison fruit!
The
Cloud Minders
Grade:
C+
Pretty
simple examination of prejudice: Kirk
and Spock arrive on the planet Stratos and find that the dwellers in the cloud
city, led by Jeff Corey as Plasus, are cultured and sophisticated artists, reaping
the benefits of the simple minded miners on the planet below, who work in mines
on a harsh and unforgiving planet. Spock
is particularly taken with Droxine (Diana Ewing), Plasus’ beautiful
daughter. Vanna (Charlene Polite) is the
leader of the mentally inferior Troglyte miners, and when Dr. McCoy reveals
that Zenite gas has affected the mental capacity of the Troglytes, Plasus
refuses to believe it. When Kirk
attempts to make Vanna believe, she kidnaps him! He eventually gets the upper hand and risks a
diplomatic incident to convince Plasus the gas is real by sealing them in the
mines and forcing Plasus and Vanna to dig (aided by some of Scotty’s
transporter expertise). It works, and in
the end, Droxine is set to become one of the first to help the Troglytes. Uhura is the only other regular character here, and she just does her job.
The
Savage Curtain
Grade:
B-
The
one where President Lincoln comes aboard!
Kirk knows he can’t be the real thing, yet treats him as such. Lee Bergere as Abraham Lincoln charms the
crew, and is particularly charmed by Uhura, whom he calls “a charming negress,”
yet she explains she is not offended by his term. His appearance is all part of a plan by the
rock-like alien Excalbians, led by Yarnek (Janos Prohaska, voiced by Bart La
Rue), to pit Kirk, Spock, Lincoln, and Barry Atwater as Surak, the father of
Vulcan philosophy, against some of history’s greatest villains – Phillip Pine,
Carol Daniels, Nathan Jung, and Bob Herron as the evil Col. Green, Zora,
Genghis Khan, and Kahless, the forefather of the Klingons – for a duel against
good and evil, to see which one is stronger and the tactics each would
use. Surprisingly, little is determined,
except that universal peace is a desirable goal, but hardly attainable, even in
Roddenberry’s idealized vision of the future!
Scotty and McCoy voice their opinions about these illusory creations
while Sulu and Chekov pilot the ship.
All
Our Yesterdays
Grade:
B+
Kirk,
Spock, and McCoy find themselves trapped in the past on the planet Sarpeidon,
Kirk in the planet’s medieval period, Spock and McCoy in the planet’s ice age
from 5,000 years ago. The planet’s sun
is about to go supernova, and while checking on the planet, they discover all
the inhabitants have been sent into the past through a library time portal by
the only remaining person, Ian Wolfe as Mr. Atoz (Mr. A to Z; he’s the
librarian, get it?). After accused of
being a witch (by Dr. Crusher?), Kirk discovers from a prosecutor (Kermit
Murdock), also from the planet’s future, that if he wasn’t processed correctly,
he must get back or he will die, and he helps Kirk get back to the
library. Meanwhile, Spock and McCoy find
Zarabeth (Mariette Hartley), a beautiful woman, condemned to live out the rest
of her life alone in the planet’s ice age as punishment. Spock begins reverting to his ancestors’
primitive past, and Zarabeth lies, telling him he can’t go back, when in fact,
only she can’t go back. McCoy reasons
with Spock, and they make it back in time.
Once they are all back in the library, Mr. Atoz makes his escape into
the planet’s past. Of the other
regulars, only Scotty’s voice is heard over the communicator.
Turnabout
Intruder
Grade:
B-
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