“The Empath” is a weird episode that looks very much like they ran out of budget to build sets. Most of the episode takes place in an interior that is obviously a sound stage with a few props and no walls – the scene just fades away into unlit blackness in the distance.

It begins with Kirk, Spock, and McCoy (being the three most expendable members of the crew) beaming down to a planet to evacuate a research station because the planet’s sun is about to go nova. But the researchers have vanished, possibly something to do with the unnatural 4 shadows cast by the unusual lighting on the planet’s surface. After a quick look around, they vanish as well, mysteriously reappearing 121.32 metres below the surface of the planet, according to Spock’s tricorder. Here they meet the mute Gaussian girl of the week, who inhabits this mysterious empty subterranean sound stage, with only a prop lounge to sit on.

It turns out she (dubbed “Gem” by McCoy, who takes a fancy to her) is an experimental subject being used by a pair of sinister big-brained rubber-forehead aliens, the Vians. They torture Kirk and McCoy to see how Gem reacts. She turns out to be an empath, having the psychic power to heal by transferring wounds to herself. Basically, the Vians want to see if Gem is self-sacrificing enough to deserve to live, whereupon they’ll save her entire planet and species from the nova. Not that the existence of another populated planet in the star system was mentioned before.

Throughout this we’re treated to Scotty back on the Enterprise saying of Kirk, “He’ll be more worried about us than we are about him,” followed by a hard cut to Kirk being tortured, with his shirt off naturally. Kirk then has to choose which of Spock or McCoy gets tortured next. McCoy gets not one – “I’m a doctor, not a coal miner” – but two – “I’m not a mechanic!”

Kirk sums up with an empassioned speech about the importance of emotions over implacable indifference that convinces the Vians to stop torturing everyone and just get on with saving Gem’s people. They agree and vanish with Gem, and return the crew to the Enterprise in an ending that seems way too rapid, given the amount of padding earlier in the episode. The question of what the Vians actually do with Gem and her people is never actually answered – for all we know they buggered off and murdered her off-screen. Oh well, never mind, Kirk, McCoy, and Scotty end the episode with a biblical reference and head on to their next adventure.

Well, it’s kind of a blah episode. Honestly, I was just bored by it. By the end I didn’t really care what happened any more, if only they could get out of that unlit sound stage. Gem really only came across as sympathetic because she was the Girl of the Week and therefore you knew she was supposed to be. And the main plot element was never really resolved unambiguously at the end of it all.

Tropes: Ontological Mystery, Ludicrous Precision, Cute Mute, Gaussian Girl, Girl Of The Week, My Brain Is Big, Rubber Forehead Aliens, The Empath, Psychic Powers, Empathic Healer, Secret Test Of Character, Humanity On Trial (variant species), Description Cut, Shirtless Scene, Sadistic Choice, I’m A Doctor, Not A Placeholder (twice!), Talking The Monster To Death, Emotions Vs Stoicism, Screw You, Elves!, Padding, As The Good Book Says.
Body count: Two scientists from the research station, found dead in giant test tubes in the wall-less sound stage.

“Wink of an Eye” is an interesting episode, and one I actually remember fairly well, for good reasons. It has an intriguing premise and the story proceeds with some mystery, then suspense and drama.

It begins with the Enterprise answering a distress call from the planet Scalos, but when they arrive all they find as a deserted city. The only life appears to be an annoying insect buzzing. While investigating, Kirk and McCoy see crewman Compton vanish right in front of their eyes! They beam back up, and then strange things start happening – equipment malfunctions, and then a weird piece of equipment appears mysteriously in engineering, hooked up to the life support system. Kirk and Spock try to disconnect it, but it’s protected by some sort of force field. Kirk returns to the bridge, where he hears the strange insect buzzing again before sipping some coffee.

Kirk notices everyone else on the bridge slow down and then apparently become paralysed. The Scalosian queen Deela appears, clad in an airy costume reminiscent of some sort of air sprite. Kirk demands to know what she’s done with his crew, but she smiles and says nothing, what she has done is to hyper-accelerate Kirk, so that he moves at a speed beyond human perception. This explains the “insect” buzzing – it is the high-pitched sound of the Scalosians moving around unseen by the crew. Now Kirk is effectively one of them and Deela says he can never return – they have searched for a way to reverse the effect for years and failed. Deela also explains that she needs Kirk… for breeding purposes. All the male Scalosians have been rendered infertile, so they maintain their culture by kidnapping males from passing spaceships.

The episode then cuts back and forth between Kirk, Deela, and some male Scalosians (including the jealous Rael, who wears some impressive space clothes) in hyper-accelerated time, and the rest of the Enterprise crew in normal time. This is necessary for the plotting, but it raises the logic problem of how Kirk can progress through hours of normal time without living through the subjective equivalent of days or months at his hyper-accelerated rate. This niggle is never dealt with, alas. A clever bit of cinematography I noticed is the heavy use of Dutch angles when shooting in the hyper-accelerated frame, to contrast it visually from the normal speed frame. This is subtle if you’re not paying attention, but very effective at separating the two interlinked story threads and giving an off-kilter feel to Kirk’s predicament.

Back in real-time, Compton reappears, dead, apparently of old age. In accelerated time, Deela explains to Kirk that living at such speed wears their kidnapped males out rapidly, so they will freeze the Enterprise using the gizmo attached to the life support system, so they have a stock of new males for the next while. Kirk records a message for Spock and leaves it where it will be found, then decides to play along with Deela, taking her to his quarters, where he seduces her with a kiss. Cut to Spock finding the recording and deciphering the buzzing sound on it as Kirk sped up, then McCoy preparing a serum to counteract the hyper-acceleration. Cut back to Kirk sitting on the edge of his bunk putting his boots back on, while Deela fixes her hair at the mirror.

McCoy finishes the serum, but they have no way to get it to Kirk. Spock drinks a sample of Scalosian water to hyper-accelerate himself and find Kirk. Together they defeat Rael and the others, and beam them back to Scalos. Kirk has a semi-sad parting with Deela, but decides they can’t do anything for the Scalosians, so he abandons them on their planet. This is a rather callous ending – Kirk doesn’t try to come up with any way to save the Scalosian culture, but rather decides he needs to warn other ships to stay away, until their race dies out. This is the only serious plotting problem with this episode – it just seems far too callous. Finally, when Spock returns to normal time with McCoy’s serum, he says he found it to be “an accelerating experience“. Apparently Vulcans are not above sleazy puns.

In the end, this is a refreshingly good episode for season three. It’s clever, tense, and dramatic. I’m hoping there are still a few more like this to come.

Tropes: Some Kind Of Force Field, Time Stands Still, Theiss Titillation Theory, Super Speed, Only You Can Repopulate My Race, Green-Eyed Monster, Dutch Angle, Boldly Coming, Sexy Discretion Shot, Incredibly Lame Pun.
Body count: Enterprise crewman Compton (old age).

“Plato’s Stepchildren“. Good lord, this is a bad episode.

The Enterprise answers a distress call for urgent medical assistance on an unsurveyed planet. They are met by a huge shadow, which turns out to be cast by the dwarf Alexander. The local ruler Parmen is dying of an infected wound, which McCoy heals. While ill, Parmen’s scary powers manifested spontaneously in his delirium. The natives turn out to be disciples of Plato, from Ancient Greece on Earth (it seems every uber-powerful alien race has visited and/or modelled their society on pre-21st century Earth for some reason), and live in a self-proclaimed Utopia, in which they have honed their psychic powers and attained near-immortality. They explain that because they live so long and are so healthy, they have no need for doctors – thus the distress call. Paradoxically, they also explain that because they’ve eliminated disease, their immune systems are incredibly weak, so a simple cut can be fatal. I am not making this up.

To cut a long and tedious plot short, Parmen insists that McCoy stays behind to act as a doctor to the remaining 38 Platonians. He refuses, and Parmen chucks a hissy fit, using psychic powers to prevent him, Kirk, and Spock from leaving. He beams down Uhura and Nurse Chapel, and then subjects them all to humiliating psychic human puppetry. This includes a couple of the most cringeworthy moments in the entire series, as Kirk acts as a horse, bucking and neighing, with Alexander riding on his back, and Spock sings and dances and is almost forced to step on Kirk’s face. Also notable is Kirk and Uhura being forced to kiss – which is an historic scene, often cited as the first interracial kiss on American TV (though apparently there were a couple of lesser known earlier ones, and this one is hidden by their heads). Nowadays it just comes across as embarrassingly bad acting.

Kirk and Spock manage to gain psychic powers from a special serum McCoy prepares from the native food (a trick which they forget about and never use again in the series), and use them to challenge Parmen. Alexander is the only non-psychic Platonian, and used as a lackey and buffoon by the others. His resentment bubbles to boiling point and he attacks Parmen with a knife, but Kirk tells him not to be so petty. At this point, they simply leave the planet, taking Alexander with them, and that’s the end. They never really resolve the problem of a planetful of dangerous psychics, except by saying they’ll warn others to stay away.

Meh. A painful episode to watch.

Tropes: BLAM Episode, Big Shadow, Little Creature, Malfunction Malady, Ancient Astronauts, Uncanny Village, Psychic Powers, Wall Banger, Kick The Dog, Playing With Puppets, People Puppets, Kissing Discretion Shot, Forgotten Phlebotinum, Left Hanging.
Body Count: None.

“The Tholian Web” begins with the Enterprise searching for the USS Defiant, missing for three weeks. It shows up adrift and Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and Chekov beam over to investigate. For some unexplained reason they all wear bulky environmental suits – something nobody has ever done before when beaming into a hazardous situation (or even down to an alien planet). Of course the suits still allow you to see the actors’ faces. The Defiant crew are all dead, apparently having killed one another. In fact, they are sprawled in incredibly unlikely poses across consoles and furniture, more like they’ve been artfully arranged. Chekov asks if there’s ever been a mutiny in Starfleet before, and Spock declares there is “absolutely no record of mutiny on a starship before”. I guess he forgot about Gary Mitchell, or even himself telling Captain Pike, “I know it is treachery and it is mutiny, but I must do this.”.

The Defiant begins to fade out like some futuristic Brigadoon, and of course there’s a transporter malfunction, meaning someone has to stay behind. Spock volunteers but Kirk, being the captain and therefore less important, orders Spock back to the Enterprise while he stays himself. When the others beam back, they immediately take their suits off, without any sort of decontamination procedure. Bad idea, as soon Chekov begins to go nuts, attacking fellow crew members, until confined to quarters. Meanwhile, the Defiant disappears, taking Kirk with it.

Some aliens appear to complicate matters, the Tholians, who warn the Enterprise to leave their territory immediately. They don’t take Spock’s “rescue mission” answer kindly and start wrapping the Enterprise in the most intriguing thing in the episode – some sort of space web made of energy. McCoy uses the time to mix bright primary coloured solutions in the med lab, searching for a cure for the plague of aggression running through the ship. He says it’s caused by the region of space, which is unstable and should bring the Defiant back so they can rescue Kirk some time in the near future.

Alas things go poorly and everyone decides Kirk must be dead. Spock gives a perfunctory eulogy, then he and McCoy open Kirk’s sealed message, only to be played when he is dead. Kirk basically tells them to get along better. Uhura sees a ghostly image of Kirk and is confined to sickbay on the assumption that she’s going nuts, but when others see it, they take it as evidence that Kirk is still alive and ready to be rescued when the Defiant reappears. They do so, and beaming Kirk back aboard somehow causes the Enterprise to be thrown several parsecs clear of the Tholian web (which was of course seconds from being completed), thus completely circumventing the only thing that really had us wondering how they’d get out of this one. The amusing ending consists of Kirk asking Spock and McCoy if his last orders were helpful, and both of them sincerely replying that they didn’t have time to view them (marking an occasion when Spock tells a bald-faced lie for no apparent logical reason).

The most intriguing thing about this episode is the energy web the Tholians are weaving about the Enterprise, and the dramatic tension as it approaches its completion. What will happen then?! And this is completely defused in a deus ex machina escape. But overall it’s not terrible, and does hold interest throughout, even if it’s defused lamely at the end. Slightly below par.

Tropes: Ghost Ship, In Space Everyone Can See Your Face, Brigadoon, Phlebotinum Breakdown, Russian Guy Suffers Most, Space Madness, Door Jam, Beehive Barrier, Technicolour Science, Hate Plague, Video Wills, Just In Time, Deus Ex Machina.
Body count: Entire crew of the USS Defiant (pre-credits).

“For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky” is distinguished by having the longest title of any Star Trek episode. And that’s about the only thing that distinguishes it. I know I’ve seen this episode several times before, yet at no stage during it did I recall any of what was happening. The ending was a genuine surprise to me. It’s not a terrible episode, it’s just… boring.

It begins melodramatically, with McCoy telling Kirk that in a routine medical check-up, he’s discovered he (McCoy) has xenopolycythemia, which will kill him within a year. This is overshadowed by a “primitive” nuclear missile attack on the Enterprise. The attacker turns out to be an asteroid vessel – a generation ship in which the inhabitants live inside the hollowed out body. The twist is that the inhabitants don’t know they’re on a spaceship, and assume they live on a real planet. They discover this by Kirk, Spock, and McCoy beaming over and immediately getting captured. The beautiful high priestess Natira in a flimsy costume takes them below the “surface” to where the people live in tunnels.

Natira takes them to the Oracle, which is a strange idol that lives in a room. It zaps the heroes with some sort of electric knockout beam. Coming to, they meet an old man, who is amazed to learn that they are from the stars. The old man says he doesn’t believe they are on a planet, because he climbed a forbidden mountain and knows the Oracle lies, “For the world is hollow and I have touched the sky“. The Oracle immediately strikes the old man dead with a slave implant in the man’s temple. Natira falls in love at first sight with McCoy, who tells her he only has a year to live, but she doesn’t mind.

Meanwhile Spock and Kirk snoop around and discover the Oracle is a computer and the people on the asteroid are descendants of the Fabrini – a civilisation destroyed by a nova 10,000 years ago. Oddly, Spock can read their writing. They get into trouble, but Natira agrees to let them go when McCoy says he’ll stay with her. McCoy needs to get a slave device implanted, which he acquiesces to surprisingly meekly. Kirk and Spock decide they need to break the Prime Directive and tell the inhabitants that they are on a space ship, not a planet, because it’s about to collide with a populated planet. Natira doesn’t believe them, preferring to believe the Oracle’s pronouncements to the contrary. The Oracle goes nuts, raising the temperature in the Oracle room in an apparent attempt to sweat Kirk and Spock to death (lucky Spock is a Vulcan) – rather than using its demonstrated electrical shock ability to simply kill them on the spot. Some Fabrini guards stand by wearing lurid space pyjamas.

In the end they disable the Oracle, convince Natira they are telling the truth, and then raid the Fabrini medical database for a cure for McCoy’s life-threatening condition. McCoy decides to leave with the Enterprise and Natira is heartbroken, but promises to lead them to a new world for them to colonise. Gosh, it sounds more exciting than it was when actually watching the episode. There was so much potential with the storyline and the fact that the inhabitants didn’t know they were on a spaceship, but it isn’t developed in any interesting way and the story plays out so slowly and predictably that it completely fails to hold any interest. A complete non-event.

Tropes: Long Title, Your Days Are Numbered, That’s No Moon, Generation Ships, Hollow World, City In A Bottle, Theiss Titillation Theory, Title Drop, Shock Collar, Love At First Sight, Deus Est Machina, Alien Non-Interference Clause, Colony Drop, Religion Is Wrong, AI Is A Crapshoot, Space Clothes.
Body count: The Old Man (zorched by the Oracle).