Plot – A huge bio dome spaceship that is dressed up as an asteroid. Say what you will about the third season of TOS, it wasn’t afraid to flaunt some pretty big ideas. To have been travelling for so long that your people have forgotten you are on a spaceship and believe it is a world, is another powerful concept. The mystery derives from why the people on this spaceship are forbidden to discover that this isn’t a world but a means of travel.
You see Kirk is smart enough to completely dismiss the Prime Directive if he thinks that the alternative is the annihilation of a species. Picard would probably opt for the latter and Janeway would mull it over for ages. Sisko would probably kill them himself. Ultimately, he decides in a critical moment to explain the situation but he tries to make it as gentle a transition as possible.
Character – How galling it must be for Dr McCoy to have to report to Kirk that the only person to fail the medical examinations…is himself. And that he only has a year left to live. It’s an unusual dilemma for a character to find themselves in on Star Trek where medicine has reached a stage when most terminal illnesses have been cured (or certainly they are never mentioned). The way the episode immediately deals with the news might not be dramatically satisfying (Kirk informs Starfleet medical and requests a replacement CMO) but it does make a lot of good sense. Given he only has a year to live, it seems very reasonable that McCoy would want to get on with his work rather than surrender to his illness.
There’s a very funny moment when McCoy admits that it shows great taste for Natira to be more interested than him than Kirk or Spock, where Kirk finds that highly questionable. There are plenty of Trek episodes where characters make what seem to be hasty decisions to stay with people they have just fallen in love with (Dax in Meridian is a particularly unconvincing example) but McCoy’s decision to remain here with a beautiful woman makes perfect sense when you factor in the knowledge that he only has a year to live. If somebody was offering the chance of love and a community and a religion when you have so little time I can see why somebody, even McCoy, would embrace those comforts. Had this society been presented as a warmer, more welcoming one and the romance angle been more overtly sexual and less cod-romance I really could have bought into McCoy’s desire to stay.
We know that McCoy isn’t really going to stay on this suicide planet but the script spends some considerable time convincing us that it will, and the other regular characters as well and you can feel the bond between them when they think they are going to have to say goodbye.
Production – Fortunately they can use the usual stock planet’s surface set for the asteroid since for some reason it is posing as one.
Bask in the enjoyment of the doors opening on the surface and men dressed in brightly coloured ponchos attack Kirk, Spock and McCoy. This might be one of those occasions where you would wish you had beamed down a ton of redshirts to avoid the embarrassment of first contact.
Best moment – I really like how they have a profound effect on the people that are living here. No longer will they be heading towards their destruction and they understand the true nature of their ‘world’ now. Kirk, Spock and McCoy have had a real impact on their society in (hopefully) a positive way. I wish they had let McCoy’s illness linger for a few more episodes because it would have been interesting to have seen that played out long term and to see him coming to terms with the implications. However, another good reason for going to this asteroid is the fact that they can sew up this blind alley medical dilemma in the same episode. It’s quite a neat package, even if it is ignoring the dramatic possibilities.
Worst moment – If it hadn’t been a sentient computer behind this whole thing I would have been truly surprised but instead (and no matter how well staged it is – with Kirk and Spock doing a particularly tricky Crystal Maze task) when Spock leapt through the wall to discover a bank of flashing lights I crumpled in my seat. This is TOS, what else would it be?
I wish they hadn’t done that – What a shame that an episode that flaunts such intelligent ideas should indulge in the usual TOS romance nonsense. Especially when McCoy and Yolanda have zero chemistry and the scenes are padded out with very cod starry-eyed dialogue. ‘Until I saw you there was nothing in my heart to sustain my life…now it sings!’
A reason to watch this episode again – A pleasing sense of ambition pervades this episode, with some excellent high concept ideas and a chance for the trio of Kirk, Spock and McCoy to have an adventure in an unusual location. What lets it down is the soppy and limp romance angle and how it refuses to scratch beneath the surface of the powerful philosophies in play. For the third season of TOS this is a middling affair, but with just enough intrigue to get a passing grade. If nothing else it does try to open your mind to some strong SF notions and Star Trek should always be commended for doing that.
*** out of *****
Clue for tomorrow's episode:
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