originally posted 8/19/20
“During Spock’s court-martial, video images of Capt. Pike’s encounter with the psychic Talosians reveals Spock’s motivation for hijacking the ship.”
Yes, there’s been a bit of a delay – no reason other than the kid isn’t interested in this series, and it’s actually a bit of a chore to try to come up with funny (or at least interesting, I hope) observations, and I don’t want this to turn into a task instead of a fun thing to do. Don’t worry – I fully intend to watch through the series. I’m listening to Rachel Watches Star Trek as I go, because that’s a great podcast and I highly recommend it to all Trekkies. Do a watch-through as you go, because fun.
We open on Kirk, Spock, and Mendez posing and doing a stylized recap of Spock pleading guilty. Eh, why not?
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Spock reveals that the Keeper is in charge of what they’re seeing now, and we go back into clips from The Cage.
It’s weird to think that Jeffrey Hunter might have had a longer life if he’d stuck with Star Trek. He received a traumatic brain injury on set in 1968 and ultimately died in a fall at his home six months later. If his career had taken a different path, that may not have happened. Not to diss Shatner, but Pike might have been an interesting captain.
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“Space vehicle Enterprise.” Thank you, rejected pilot weirdness!
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I’m also kind sad we didn’t get more Number One. A female first officer in the 60s would have been almost as revolutionary as a Black bridge officer.
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Ugh, the damsel-in-distress voice…we’re still working on having women seen as fully-realized people on film and TV, but at least we don’t talk like Snow White anymore.
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Vina drops the Snow White voice when she tries to talk sense into Pike. That’s a plus.
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60s FIGHT SCENE! Everybody moves slow and the villain is vaguely Russian!
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Spock reveals that the Talosians want Pike back. They’ve stopped the images because Pike is fatigued. Mendez isn’t happy, but they recess anyway
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Vina can become any woman Pike imagines. Ick. Meanwhile. Number One sets up a death ray to blast the rock face where Pike disappeared. Not sure why the doctor is there but Spock is on the Enterprise, but OK.
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Pike has figured out that Vina is real, and the Talosians want them as breeding stock.
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And now Vina is an Orion slave girl, while Pike watches her dance, accompanied by two greasy old creepy guys. Ick. At least he has the decency to look uncomfortable.
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Back on the Enterprise, Number One gets ready to beam down with an away team, but the transporter only beams her and a female crewman down. Cue Spock with a particularly un-Spocklike shout of “The women!”
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The Keeper tried to sneak into Pike’s cage to get the phasers Number One and the female crewman beamed down with, and Pike managed to capture him.
Turns out they aren’t phasers yet, they’re lasers. Ok.
Pike uses a laser to blast a hole in the cage, but the Keeper used an illusion to make it look like it didn’t work. Pike offers to blow a hole in he Keeper’s head instead, and the Keeper drop the illusion.
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The Talosians stop sending images, and Mendez asks Pike to vote guilty or not guilty. All three vote guilty as charged. The Talosians take control of the Enterprise and put it in orbit around Talos IV, and then start showing the images again. Better late than never?
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Back in the clips from the original pilot, Pike, Vina, and all have made it to the surface, where the Keeper says they wanted them to be all along, and offers to let Pike and the women of his choosing to stay on the surface and the Talosians will provide whatever plant life they need to survive. Pike agrees to stay as long as they let the Enterprise and crew go, but Number One sets her proto-phaser to overload, threatening to blow all of them up unless the Keeper lets Pike leave too.
The Keeper says humans are too violent to keep in captivity, and says they’re free to go. Vina says she can’t go, and the Keeper drops her illusion to show that she was badly injured in the crash and they didn’t know how to put her together correctly. Pike beams back to the Enterprise without her.
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When Kirk turns to Mendez to discuss what they’ve just seen, Mendez disappears and the Keeper appears on screen to explain that Mendez was never there, and the court-martial was a distraction to get he Enterprise back to Talos IV. They offer to let Pike live on Talos IV with them and Vina.
The real Mendez sends a message to the Enterprise that I see the circumstances, no action wll be taken against Spock. Kirk asks Pike if he wants to live on Talos IV, and he beeps yes. Pike beams down, and the Keeper sends an image of him and Vina going off to live happily ever after. Happy endings all around!
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Definitely a clip and bottle episode, but at least the clips came from an unaired (at that time) episode, and they framed it with an original story. It worked way better than the first season TNG clip episode where Riker was in a coma and reliving episodes we’d all just seen.
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