“Bones travels back to 1930s America and inadvertently destroys the future. To reverse the damage, Kirk and Spock also go back, and Kirk falls in love.”
I wonder if this episode is going to be not sad or less sad now that I’m an adult. Also, I wonder how much time travel is because of budget constraints. Why don’t they ever go to the future?
***
We open on the bridge, which is evidently experiencing turbulence. They’re orbiting a planet and mapping this space turbulence, and need a few more orbits to complete the scan. Suddenly, the helm console explodes, injuring Sulu. McCoy is called to the bridge.
The turbulence is “ripples in time,” according to Spock. Kirk orders Uhura to send Starfleet Command his log entry from the previous week, which he then summarizes for the benefit of the audience.
Meanwhile, we get a closeup of Sulu’s fabulous eye shadow while McCoy doses him with “cordruzine,” which Kirk describes as “risky stuff.” Sulu wakes up with a smile, though, so clearly it worked.
They hit another time ripple, and McCoy falls onto the hypospray of cordruzine, injecting himself with what sounds like all of it based on how long the sound effect lasted. Whoops.
McCoy starts freaking out, calling the bridge crew murderers, then makes a dramatic and violent exit from the bridge, and we cut to opening credits.
***
While security is searching for McCoy, he sneaks into the transporter room all wild-eyed and knocks out the transporter chief with some quick karate chops. Then he beams himself somewhere. Turns out he’s beamed himself into the center of the time disturbance.
Kirk, Spock, Scotty, Uhura, and two expendable redshirts beam down to the same spot. Kirk declares that the ruins extend to the horizon, thus saving money on building a bigger set or using a matte painting. They approach an upright stone circle, which seems to be the source of the time displacement. Spock declares it to be scientifically impossible.
McCoy meanwhile evades detection with the advanced stealth technique of “hiding behind a rock.”
The giant stone circle starts talking to Kirk and Spock. It is very smug. It’s called the Guardian of Forever, and it’s the smartest time portal in the room. It then emits stage fog and starts showing stock footage.
McCoy emerges from his rock and is overpowered by the landing party. Kirk then speculates about going back one day and preventing the hypospray accident. Before they can do more than speculate, McCoy gets loose and jumps through the time portal.
Uhura loses contact with the ship. The Guardian tells them that “all that you knew is gone.” McCoy has somehow changed the past, and the landing party is stranded.
Spock had been using his tricorder to record the images from the Guardian when McCoy jumped. He determines they can arrive within a week of when McCoy does. The Guardian tells them that if they succeed, they will return to their own tune as though they never left.
Kirk and Spock jump through the portal and arrive in 1930s New York. They find some clothes conveniently hanging out to dry and steal them, but are stopped by a police officer. Kirk attempts to explain that Spock is Chinese and got his head stuck in a mechanical rice picker as a child, but the cop attempts to arrest them anyway. Spock knocks him it with the Vulcan nerve pinch and they run.
They end up in an unlocked basement, where they change into the stolen clothes. Spock points out that if he could access the ship’s computer he could look at the images from the tricorder and determine when and where McCoy arrives, and Kirk challenges him to build a computer out of 1930s-era parts.
A woman walks in on them. It’s Joan Collins, aka Edith Keeler, so naturally the camera goes into soft focus to indicate Kirk wants to bang her. After explaining the situation, Kirk does puppy dog eyes, and she agrees to hire them at 15 cents an hour to help her with various jobs. Turns out they’ve stumbled onto a homeless shelter.
***
The 21st Street Mission provides food, as long as you listen to Edith give a weird speech about space travel. Kirk is impressed.
Edith also sets them up with a room at a flophouse. Now they’re making money working for her, and housing. Pretty good for just having arrived from the future.
Spock wastes no time in building his radio tube computer. Unfortunately, he needs a 5-6lb block of platinum. He compares the equipment he has to work with to “stone knives and bearskins.”
While working at the mission, Spock sees men using tools to repair pocket watches. After they’re done, Spock picks the lock on the toolbox where they’re kept so he can borrow them. Edith discovers this and confronts him, but Kirk vouches for him, and she accepts that as long as Kirk walks her home.
Meanwhile, Spock is able to see some of the recorded information from the tricorder - a newspaper clipping saying Edith Keeler is killed. When Kirk looks at it, though, it’s from 6 years in the future and says Edith conferred with FDR. They can’t both be true, so she’s the focal point.
***
McCoy suddenly appears in an alley and starts freaking out on a guy who was stealing a bottle of milk. He yells “Don’t run! I won’t kill you!” like a total non-murderer.
He catches up to the guy, continues to freak out, then passes out. The guy steals his phaser and inadvertently vaporizes himself with it.
***
Kirk walks Edith home again and she continues to impress him by basically predicting the Federation. He then tells Spock to fix the computer so he knows whether or not Edith lives.
McCoy arrives at the mission looking terrible. Edith takes him to a cot in the back room, exiting with him just as Spock enters.
***
Spock is finally able to analyze the data from the tricorder. Turns out Edith’s peace movement delayed America’s entry into WW2, giving Germany the chance to create the atomic bomb and win the war. Edith Keeler must die.
***
McCoy wakes up in the mission, back to normal. He doesn’t believe he’s in 1930, and tells Edith who he is. She says she knows someone who talks about Earth the way he does, but he doesn’t seem interested.
Later, he says he’s decided he’s having a cordruzine hallucination, but that she’s real. He offers to do some work at the mission to help her out. She says she’ll talk to him about that later, because he’d young man is taking her to a Clark Gable movie. McCoy has no idea who Clark Gable is, which she finds odd, but ultimately dismisses.
Later, as she and Kirk are crossing the street and nearly get hit by a car, she said they can catch the Clark Gable movie at the Orpheum. When Kirk doesn’t recognize the name, she says McCoy said the same thing. Kirk tells her to wait right there and runs back to the mission to tell Spock, and McCoy exits the mission at the same time. They have a happy reunion, but Edith, not paying attention to her surroundings, steps out in front of a truck.
Kirk and McCoy both move to save her, but at the last second Kirk holds McCoy back. McCoy says “I could have saved her! Do you know what you just did?” To which Spock replies “He knows, Doctor. He knows.”
They jump back through the Guardian and everything is set right. Uhura says the Enterprise is asking if they’re ready to beam up. Kirk just says “Let’s get the hell out of here,” and the episode ends.
***
There’s no question why this one is a classic. I honestly couldn’t get into the character of Edith Keeler, but the concept of having to let her die to save the world is incredible. And you really feel for Kirk when he has to make that decision. Ending it where they did with no jokey conclusion scene cemented the emotional punch. Also, the chemistry between Kirk, Spock, and McCoy was stellar in this episode. Letting Kirk be funny is always a good choice.
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