STATS

Original Airdate: 9/15/66
Starting Stardate: 1533.6

STORY

The Enterprise takes on a teenage boy that was the sole survivor of a crash when he was 3, and some of the strange things that begin to happen onboard show there may be more to him that appears.

STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS

• Robert Walker Jr. looks like a young Patrick Duffy! HA!
• Random Red Shirt Crewman slaps random Blue Jumpsuit Crewman on the ass after crawling out of a Jeffrey’s Tube. odd
• Charlie tries the same move on Yeoman Rand…much to her surprise. Classic
• Kirk plays with 3.5″ floppy disks
• Spock smiling while playing the Vulcan lyre
• Kirk makes a reference to Thanksgiving…that the crew is made to eat “synthetic meatloaf”…but he wants to make it look like turkey. ewwww
• In addition to 3D chess…there is also a shot that shows 3D checkers as well (around 18:37)
• Starfleet cartwheel club!
• Kirk has his gi (shirt) off for no reason in the work-out room.
• Is the guy in the back ground watching Kirk and Charlie “work out” pumping iron…or generating power for the Enterprise’s electrical system?
• Kirk is wearing panty-hoes for underwear!
• Everyone is sweaty all the time, again. Those lights on the set must have been very warm.
• The episode is a lot of the Twilight Zone episode “It’s A Good Life” which also aired on CBS 5 years earlier in 1961.
• Generally, when you make a program around an annoying character, the program itself ends up annoying the audience.
• The ending feels very unsatisfying because Kirk and company don’t resolve the problem. The resolution comes to them.

SPOCK’S “POWER OF THE WEEK”

• Vulcan lyre-playing rock star
• Chessmaster

SHAT-ATTACK

09:23: “Gentlemen…the fact is…the boy is here…and he’s alive…and he needs our help.”
43:45: “You’ve got my ship…and I want it back. I want my crew back, whole…even if I have to break your neck to do it!”
43:58: Kirk in pain! Classic Shatner over-acting!
48:56: “It’s alright, Yeoman. It’s all over now”

RED SHIRT ALERT

Crew of the U.S.S. Antares

MCCOY-ISM’S

None!

FINAL THOUGHTS

Zark: I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the difference between good writing and bad writing. Often in a story, the writer lets you the audience know what is coming before the characters in the story do. When something is written well, you anticipate what is coming and relish watching it unfold. When it’s not written so well, you want to scream at the characters for not already knowing what you know. This episode is a case of the latter. As the second episode aired, though, it’s decent enough. Set solely onboard the Enterprise, you get to see a lot of the ship and crew and life onboard the ship. The story premise also gives you a chance to think “what would I do in this situation.”

Justin: Kirk is legitimized by everyone as the alpha male on the Enterprise in this episode…thus cementing his reputation as THE space stud. Very little explanation on what made Charlie the way he was other than the exposition from the floating, semi-transparent head at the end. Then, like magic, the hour is up and things are back to normal again. Gotta love Star Trek for that!

Presented by Zark from zarkseven.com and Justin from justinriggle.com