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Post by TrekBeatTK on Feb 3, 2015 8:55:03 GMT -5
I also forgot that "Is There in Truth No Beauty" was the first time "peace and long life" was offered as an alternative to "live long and prosper". For a long time I thought that originated with TNG.
THE SAVAGE CURTAIN -- It opens with Abraham Lincoln showing up and you think "Oh no..." but it's not as silly as it would seem at first. It is, however, basically a poor man's "Arena", so while it's okay it isn't amazing. I wonder if Hitler was ever considered for the "evil" side, or if that's why they invented Col. Green. Most interesting is the introduction of Surak and Kahless (who is apparently a brilliant vocal mimic, but this is never brought up again). Since Kahless is basically culled from Kirk's thoughts, that I guess explains the difference from the real Kahless we eventually meet. It's so weird to see him revered on TNG as this Klingon space Jesus, and then see him here where he's called "the father of Klingon tyranny". It's a fascinating study of how perspective changes depending on which side of the war you're on.
ALL OUR YESTERDAYS -- I would probably get bored pretty quickly, but I'd have been tempted to stay behind with Zarabeth too. The idea of having to be altered to fit to the time period you're sent is a brilliant, sensible conceit that you don't often see in science fiction. Of course your body would have to be altered for the language and disease and whatever other variables exist in another time. This makes it one of the smartest Trek time travel episodes, with only the fact that everyone speaks English standing out as an issue. (they might have UTs, but since the phasers don't work, I doubt they would either).
-TK
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Post by TrekBeatTK on Feb 8, 2015 19:24:52 GMT -5
THE PARADISE SYNDROME -- The location shooting really makes this episode. It's nice to get to a locale different from the Vasquez Rocks. That obelisk is a great prop (I kind of would love to see something like it erected in an actual forest). The music is pretty good in this one too, particularly the strings during Spock's "thinking" scenes. The idea of Kirk "going native" is good, but might have been better had they not done it so literally.
-TK
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Post by Mel on Feb 8, 2015 20:30:25 GMT -5
Yes, the perspectives are fascinating. Klingon space Jesus. Love it. 
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Post by TrekBeatTK on Feb 11, 2015 22:09:40 GMT -5
AND THE CHILDREN SHALL LEAD -- Despite its problems, I kind of like this one. That's Pamelyn Ferdin playing Mary the little girl. She also voiced Lucy Van Pelt in the movie "A Boy Named Charlie Brown" and a few other Peanuts specials of this period (the third actress to play Lucy, IIRC). She was also in the Disney musical "The One and Only Genuine Original Family Band" in the early seventies, and had other television guest appearances, such as "The Brady Bunch". That scene at the end where they all cry, she looks like she got a face full of pepper spray. So she's either a really good crier or they had some sadistic PA making her cry!
THE EMPATH -- Gem is sort of a Christ figure in this story. She's singled out to spare her people from death by taking McCoys griefs and sorrows onto herself. In that last scene where she's dying on the floor, she even lies in a sort of Christ pose. Scotty compares her to the "pearl of great price", which I never thought was particularly applicable in the episode, but makes sense if the writer is going for a religious metaphor. The story Scotty alludes to is a parable of Jesus, in which the pearl is the Kingdom of heaven. It's a very atypical Trek episode, but I like it for that.
WINK OF AN EYE -- It's a great premise, beings who are faster than we can see. What a shame that the end result is they are just left to die! What kind of resolution is that? It's back to the weird bittersweet endings that season one used to do. Theiss once again has fun costuming Deela, with a skirt that only skirts one leg. Also notable that she is the leader; we really didn't see female leaders in the first two seasons, but in season three we get Deela and the Romulan Commander in "The Enterprise Incident" (not to mention the women in "Spock's Brain").
-TK
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Post by TrekBeatTK on Feb 12, 2015 10:03:57 GMT -5
WHOM GODS DESTROY -- The inmates are running the asylum. Is Marta meant to be an Orion slave girl, or just another green person? Probably the highlight here is the two Kirks thing and Spock's deduction of the real one. The fight between the two is difficult because obviously one of them is a stunt double. What's very clever though is if you watch closely, for almost the entire fight Shatner plays Garth, and the double plays the "real" Kirk. The ending is a bit of a downer, with essentially shock therapy saving the day.
THE MARK OF GIDEON -- On one hand, it's a good idea to take overpopulation to its extreme end as a story point. And it mostly works. The idea of a world without disease seeing infection and death as a glorious solution is intriguing. But then it just becomes a not-so-subtle argument for contraception against ardent "right-to-life" folks. Gotta love the roundabout discreet way Kirk has to talk about "the new devices to prevent conception" for '60s television sensibilities. There's still a worthwhile cautionary tale here, as there are people who truly believe humans will achieve immortality one day, reversing aging and eliminating disease. And we keep creating children, even for people who can't naturally conceive. So even with condoms, pills, and abortion this is a frightening image of our potential future. BUT... why don't the people of Gideon just colonize other planets? Kirk could take some of them somewhere off-world and could send other ships to get more. Why were they going to infect "young volunteers" instead of the old first? This is also weird to watch in the era since AIDS. And how/where did they build this giant Enterprise replica??
-TK
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Post by TrekBeatTK on Feb 13, 2015 14:44:41 GMT -5
DAY OF THE DOVE -- It's good, even if the anti-Vietnam sentiment starts to feel a little heavy-handed. Funny how "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" is criticized for that, but not this one. It's still a pretty good episode though and the only time we see a Klingon woman until the movies. What I was struck most by is that it was Trek commenting on itself, essentially, stepping away from the position the show took in "A Private Little War". There, it was said that a balance of power was necessary, and the "brush wars in Asia" were cited as an example. Now, Scotty actually says something to the effect of "we can't let the Klingons study the ship! It'll alter the balance of power!" and the episode seems to suggest foolishness in this way of thinking. My one real problem is, if this is indeed a big Vietnam allegory, who do the aliens represent? The US government? I do like Spock's line about how warring parties cannot be made to stop but have to come to it themselves. Up until now, Trek had done a lot of episodes where third party aliens make them stop fighting. The Organian Peace Treaty may have halted outright aggression, but didn't end feelings of hostility nor suspicion. Here the cliche is flipped, with third party aliens encouraging war for their own benefit.
THE LIGHTS OF ZETAR -- Mira Romaine is hot. Apart from what I'm assuming is a mole on her lip that almost looks like she's got herpes or something, she's lovely and puts in a good performance too. Really the highlight of the episode which is nothing spectacular, but pretty decent for this season. Also, I'm still working on matching TOS episodes with modern Trek episodes (I've expanded it beyond TNG which is making it a little easier), and the suggestion to pair this with "Power Play" was a good one.
REQUIEM FOR METHUSELAH -- A few of Flint's previous identities seem questionable (Solomon? But that was a monarchy. He was the son of a king? How are we supposed to accept that?). It's not a bad show, though it's very talky. Like if you played it on the radio, you'd lose almost nothing. I find Kirk's love for Rayna, even knowing she's an android, to ring weirdly false. It just felt like too much too soon for me, and out of character for him. Yes, he's fallen in love before, and yes he's had feelings for others that he's denied because of his command. But to throw himself after this woman who he knows is a machine seems contradictory to the Kirk we saw in "What Are Little Girls Made Of?" I do still like the ending scene though (part of me wants to edit it a little and tack it onto the end of "City on the Edge of Forever"). Also, the girl's name is spelled "Rayna" in the episode on all the signs, but is spelled "Reena" in the end credits.
-TK
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Post by TrekBeatTK on Feb 13, 2015 23:09:49 GMT -5
THE ENTERPRISE INCIDENT -- A classic. It's fun to see Spock playing Kirk's role of seducing the alien woman in order to gain her trust. And we don't often get to see espionage on Star Trek, particularly TOS. This episode also suggests that the cloaking device is separate from whatever "invisibility screen" they had in "Balance of Terror", but how that all plays out I don't know. Romulans flying Klingon ships is weird, but it makes me all the more annoyed that TWOK opens with Klingons instead of the originally scripted Romulans in the Kobayashi Maru scene. Romulans just make more sense, and even if they wanted to reuse the footage of the Klingons ships from TMP, canon says Romulans fly Klingon-looking ships.
PLATO'S STEPCHILDREN -- Alexander is a good character. As to the first interracial kiss on television, everyone seems to forget that it was done by force while the participants recoil in fear and a crowd watches and laughs. We talk about it now like some big groundbreaking event for race relations, when it was barely removed from rape in context. We also tend to forget that immediately after kissing Uhura, Kirk comes at her with a whip. So much for race relations!
THAT WHICH SURVIVES -- The Enterprise is threatened by Catwoman. I like that cool disappearing optical used in this episode. It was different, and really the only thing memorable about this story which is so lame that D.C. Fontana took her name off it.
THE CLOUD MINDERS -- It's a very good exploration of class differences which becomes a story about environmental hazards. You'd think it's just a thinly veiled metaphor for racist attitudes about how folks of certain colors are smarter than others, but then the story twists and the Troglytes really ARE dumber than the folks on Stratos! But twist again, it's only because the system forces them to stay in an environment that causes it. This episode scares me because America seems to be going more and more in this direction where the snooty naval-gazing academics look down on the working classes even while they demand their labor. "Progressive" types love to rail at whole chunks of the country as backward, ignorant, hateful, and stupid, but they also want to give them reality shows like Honey Boo-Boo so they can laugh at them.
-TK
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Post by TrekBeatTK on Feb 14, 2015 18:07:46 GMT -5
LET THAT BE YOUR LAST BATTLEFIELD -- The black/white faces was a good idea, and a much better one than the original story concept of white people enslaved by black people. And yet there remains one bizarre holdover from the oldest version, which Charon said to be in the "southern part of the Galaxy". Is there such a thing as "south" in space? That's just dumb. It also implies that racism was a problem only in the south, which was untrue.
THE WAY TO EDEN -- I'm reminded of that hippie episode of I Dream of Jeannie. Who is the intended audience for this one? The young people who watch the show, or their parents? Doing a Timothy Leary-type character is an interesting idea, but this turns into a tritely plotted folk-rock musical fairly quickly. As a parody of Hair it's hilarious, but it's probably among the most dated Star Trek episodes. How about Spock jamming with side ponytail girl on the bicycle wheel?
TURNABOUT INTRUDER -- What becomes of the women Kirk leaves behind? Apparently they go mad with penis envy! I think this one is great and Shatner gives a great performance as "Lester". We see very little of the real Lester being crazy, but when we do it matches nicely. She also does a pretty good "Kirk". The actors sell this Freaky Friday premise well enough for it to be successful. Hey, Nurse Chapel is a brunette now, and she'll stay that way through the movies (but she goes back to blonde for the animated episodes). Knowing this is the final episode, it's nice to see some of the nods to earlier episodes, like the mention of the events of "The Tholian Web" and Spock's appeal to the crew to remember all the many strange things they've witnessed previously.
Season three is definitely a drop in quality, with some budget restrictions hurting stories (the duplicate ship in "Mark of Gideon" seeming to exist solely so they could use the same sets) and a few hackneyed attempts at relevance. But there remain bright spots sprinkled throughout. It was fun to revisit the series as a whole again. On to the animated series!
-TK
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Post by TrekBeatTK on Feb 19, 2015 22:42:48 GMT -5
This week I'm watching the TOS movies!
THE MOTION PICTURE -- I sat down and watched the theatrical version the other night for the first time in a loooooong time. In fact, I'm not sure I ever sat down and watched the theatrical cut from start to finish. It used to be the "TV version", and now it's usually the Director's Edition since I don't have my tape of the other one anymore. And there are definitely good moments that should have been in that first cut. There are things that annoy me a bit about the Director's Edition, but in general it's a better version of the movie. Some of those long stretches are just too long, and kill the pacing. From the time Kirk says, "how do you define unwarranted?" there's a full fifteen minutes before we get to "THIS is how I define unwarranted!" which would have been stronger had 5 minutes of staring at V'Ger clouds been cut out. This movie is like a combination of "Metamorphosis", "The Changeling", and "One of Our Planets is Missing". I still stand by my enjoyment of it, despite its flaws which are mostly the pacing and the color scheme. I like the little short-sleeved uniform look and Shatner looks really good in it. Too bad apart from the infamous "skant" on TNG, short-sleeve uniforms would disappear from Trek after this.
I will defend the time-consuming shuttle flight to the Enterprise (even though it makes no sense for him to fly around the front if the docking port is toward the rear) because even though it's a tad too long it REALLY sells the ship. I completely believe the tactile reality of that ship. After years of seeing a few quick opticals reused again and again on the series, these new glory shots are amazing. They really show what great model work can do; I find it so much more impressive and believable than the CG ships we've seen in the recent films. And while that scene is lengthy, the one important job it does is to address scale. We get LOTS of different angles on the ship (further lending it reality) and we see how small Kirk, Scott, and the shuttle are in comparison. When you see those little technicians floating around, you get this sense that the vessel is huge. This is important because later we will see V'Ger's vessel and the Enterprise is dwarfed by comparison. I adore the use of scale in this movie, and for me it has never been equaled until Star Trek 2009. That opening scene with the Kelvin and then Nero's ship made me so happy and I thought FINALLY we're getting scale again in a Trek movie. It was never as good as that one scene. But that's part of what I remember TMP for. Though can I ask why several shuttles dock in this movie and none of them use the shuttle bay? Seems kind of silly.
One final thought on this movie: is the scene on Vulcan necessary? I started thinking this week how the movie might have played better cutting right from Epsilon IX to Starfleet Headquarters. Everything in the Spock scene is pretty much reiterated when he arrives on the Enterprise. It might have been better to save Spock for that reveal. It also would have shaved 5 minutes out of the movie.
THE WRATH OF KHAN -- I've seen it a million times, but I was actually moved during Spock's death scene this time around. I'm not always because I know it's coming and know it word for word. In fact, I saw STIII before I saw this movie, so I already knew what happened before it happened. But it was really affecting on this viewing. Maybe it helps to have just spent the past month watching all their adventures again. Part of me wishes they would release the "sad" original version of the movie without the resurrection hints, just to see how Meyer's original vision played. Also, Spock's "Remember" is a nice little parallel to his "Forget" in "Requiem for Methuselah".
THE SEARCH FOR SPOCK -- The katra explanation is a little forced (how does Spock have memories of things he said AFTER he melded with McCoy? Exactly how does this transfer work?) While TWOK is arguably the "better" movie, a lot of this film feels the most like the series. It even culminates with Kirk in a fist fight, just like so many episodes did. A shame Uhura disappears for 40 minutes, but she gets her best scene in a Trek movie so far. And when the original theme music comes in just as the film ends, that's magical. One thing I've enjoyed this time around is noticing where the Courage theme gets worked into the movie scores. TSFS suffers a bit from "middle chapter" syndrome, but it's still a fun ride particularly if you're seeing it for the first time. This was the third Trek film I ever saw (after TMP and Generations) and I enjoyed it a lot then.
-TK
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Post by TrekBeatTK on Feb 21, 2015 20:27:32 GMT -5
THE VOYAGE HOME -- Kirk nearly getting hit by the car might be an homage to "City on the Edge of Forever", in which the same thing happens (minus exchanging "dumb ass"es). There's much to be said about this movie, but I was thinking about the music. The score is certainly no Jerry Goldsmith, nor is it the James Horner sound of the prior two films. Rosenman's main theme is actually just an altered version of his Lord of the Rings theme. Despite this, I like the bells in it. I like the "I Hate You" song (was a full version ever released?). And that music cue when they first hit the streets has a very "Beverly Hills Cop" feel to it, which is appropriate considering Eddie Murphy was almost in this movie (I still wonder what an Eddie Murphy Trek movie would feel like). Despite some of the truth of this being a lesser score when compared to the others, the light bubbly music during the chase sequences and such is very much in keeping with the series.
THE FINAL FRONTIER -- There are some lovely shots in this movie. Despite having story and budget problems, Shatner had a good eye and there's a part of me that sort of wishes he could direct another Trek movie in the future.
-TK
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Post by StarFuryG7 on Mar 20, 2015 22:27:03 GMT -5
He always pops in like this ...there's just no telling when it'll happen exactly, but he always comes back. |
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Post by StarFuryG7 on Apr 3, 2015 19:33:16 GMT -5
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Post by StarFuryG7 on Oct 24, 2015 11:21:29 GMT -5
Shatner & Joan Collins share their impressions
of
"City On the Edge Of Forever"
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Post by captainbasil on Oct 24, 2015 17:28:39 GMT -5
Shatner & Joan Collins share their impressions
of
"City On the Edge Of Forever"
This looks cool. |
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