originally posted 8/8/20
“The Enterprise arrives at a planet where a virus puts humans in a chronic childlike state. When Kirk and his team become victims, only Bones can help.”
I predict more hammy acting from Shatner in this one.
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This planet is basically a replica of Earth, because of course it is. Same continents and everything.
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They’ve beamed down to the ruins of a 60s-era American town, because I guess the Twilight Zone wasn’t filming there this week.
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Kirk just handed Spock a tricycle for no reason. And a zombie just ran out yelling “Mine! Mine!” and attacked them, then died.
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They’ve found a kid who doesn’t like “grups” like Kirk. Grups = grownups = the screenwriter has never spoken with an actual child.
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Oh ick. Kirk is hitting on Miri, the kid they found. “A pretty name for a pretty young woman.” Dude...ew. I mean, I don’t think they intended it that way, but it did not age well.
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Meanwhile, Spock and the redshirts are being taunted by children.
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Welp, Kirk is infected.
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They found a hospital to research the disease. Everyone is infected except Spock. Why isn’t Spock infected? “Green blood,” according to Bones, because casual racism.
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They’ve determined that you can’t catch the disease until you hit puberty, which is why there are no adults.
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In discussing why Miri wants to stay with them, Spock points out that she has a crush on Kirk and is approaching puberty - “she’s becoming a woman.” Ew ew ew no ew wrong gross ew. She’s becoming an older child, not a woman. My kid is about that age and if a guy creepily said she was “becoming a woman,” I’d feed him his own gonads.* Yuck. No. Bad 60s misogyny! Bad!
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Meanwhile, the landing party is working diligently on a cure. They’ve determined that children only age one month per hundred years.
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The kids are hiding out in a toy store. Their leader appears to be a 30-year-old from New Jersey pretending to be a child, but since that’s impossible with the virus, it’s just a 30-year-old actor from New Jersey cast as a preadolescent.
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Kirk just got attacked by a kid who hit puberty and was turned by the virus. He tried to stun her with his phaser, but she died. Miri says her name was Louise and she was just a little older than Miri. Yikes.
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They’ve determined that Miri has 5 or 6 weeks left, because of her age. The landing party itself has seven days.
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The adult child just stole their communicators, because reasons.
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Angry McCoy is a little scary...
Kirk just walked directly into Yeoman Rand and knocked a bunch of beakers out of her hands. As one does. Now she’s upset and wants Kirk to look at her legs. He tried to comfort her with a tepid hug but Miri gets jealous and runs off. She goes to the toy store and the kids make a plan to stop them from finding the cure, for some reason, and it looks like the kids now intend to beat the landing party to death with hammers.
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Man, they love having dramatic lighting on people’s eyes.
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Yup, Miri is infected.
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The kids are playing school, but weirdly, which again proves the screenwriter has never met a child.
Miri brought Kirk to the school to tell the other kids that they’ll all get the virus when they hit puberty, but since they’re almost out of food most of the kids will starve before they die of the virus anyway.
The kids don’t understand or believe him, and start beating him with clubs.
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Meanwhile, Bones doesn’t think they’ll get the communicators back in time, and tests the vaccine on himself. Dramatic acting ensues.
I’m also not sure why they’re calling it a vaccine and not a cure, but ok.
Kirk returns with the kids and communicators, but Bones is unconscious. The vaccine appears to have worked though because the lesions on his face are magically disappearing.
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Back on the ship, Kirk has contacted “Space Central” (not Starfleet yet? Or not Starfleet in every episode?) to send teachers and advisors to help the kids survive and rebuild their planet.
So it wasn’t a bad episode, but there was a definite creep factor to Kirk and Miri’s interactions, and casting an adult to play a child is messed up, especially considering Kim Darby, who played Miri, actually was a young-looking teenager at the time. So a 19-year-old who looks 13-14 opposite a 27-year-old who looks 27 but they’re supposed to be the same age is really questionable casting.
*this recap was written before my kid came out as trans, but the point was important enough that keeping the gender and pronouns he was using then seemed appropriate.
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