1) Star Trek: The Animated Series

Background: -

Star Trek: The Animated Series was an animated series which ran for 2 seasons 1973-4. The series continued the adventures of the Enterprise crew as featured in The Original Series, and featured the voices of William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForrest Kelley, James Doohan, Nichelle Nicholls, George Takei and Majel Barrett as, respectively, Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scotty, Uhura, Sulu and Christine Chapel. Any of the voices of other characters were provided by James Doohan and Majel Barrett.

The series was made Filmation, a company that competed with the better known Hanna-Barbera studios to produce animated TV series primarily for children. Filmation’s best known production, certainly in the UK at least, was probably He-Man and the Masters of the Universe. The Filmation style was essentially cheap looking, and more concerned with quantity than quality. They were renowned for reusing the same footage, and for using fewer frames per second than the standard 24 frames per second which was the norm pre CGI days. This gives their animation a limited, jerky quality which adds to the cheapness. They also tended to use Hanna-Barbera type sound effects fairly extensively.

The Animated Series, more than the original series, is aimed specifically at children, and this is reflected in the length of each episode. When ad breaks are taken into consideration they work out not much longer than 25 minutes, and this can have a serious effect on storytelling – it just isn’t possible in 25 minutes to appropriately utilise the 4 act structure of an Original Series script.

With the actors only providing the voices it was possible for them to record their parts at different times and in different places. William Shatner, for example, was touring in a play when a number of the voice tracks were recorded. This did mean that in some episodes there was a clearly discernible lack of spark between the actors – I’m thinking particularly of the Kirk-Spock-McCoy axis here.

Those are the negatives. There are positives. Gene Roddenberry is supposed to have refused to let Filmation have complete creative control. This was doubtless a good thing – based on the rest of Filmation’s output, had they been completely left to their own devices there would doubtless have been a far greater degree of ‘dumbing down’ than there actually was. For example, the writers used basically the same writers’ guide that the Original Series had done. A number of the writers of The Original Series returned to write episodes of the Animated Series. D.C. Fontana, who wrote one of the episodes continued to function as a script editor/story consultant, which function she had also fulfilled for some of the original series. As a rule, the episodes, being that much shorter, are more simplistic and less thoughtful than much of The Original Series, but the Animated Series is justifiably viewed as being better written than it is realised. Although Gene Roddenberry himself is said to have discounted the Animated Series as canon, it did introduce some ideas and concepts that are now mainstream within the Star Trek Universe. For example, it was in the Animated Series that we first learned that the T in James T. Kirk stands for Tiberius.

“Star Trek: The Animated Series” was the first of any version of Star Trek to win an Emmy too, a 'daytime' Emmy, specifically for the episode "How Sharper than A Serpent's Tooth".

My Thoughts

The Animated series was originally broadcast when I was about 10  or 11 years old, which was probably the best age at which to watch them. I was already a big fan of the original series, and my first thought when I watched one was that this was a bit disappointing. What with the 25 minute format, as soon as you were starting to get into the story it was over.

Still, even allowing for underdeveloped stories, and repetitive, jerky animation, I got to enjoy the series. For me, the most memorable episodes were: -

Episode 2) Yesteryear

 Briefly: -

“Yesteryear” is set on the planet of the Guardian of time from “The City On The Edge Of Forever”. History is somehow changed, as Mr. Spock now appears to have died while a child. Interestingly his place as Science Officer is filled by an Andorian, who featured in “Journey to Babel”. Spock has to go back in time to his own childhood, where he poses as a distant cousin, and saves his young self’s life. He remembers that his life was saved by an adult relative, called Selek (Tom?) when he was undergoing the Kahs-wan ordeal – a Vulcan rite of passage that involved surviving in the Vulcan desert. When he checks with the Guardian, though, he finds that he has now died in this incident. Posing as Selek he steps through the portal. He does manage to save himself, but his young self has come to a crisis when his pet sehlat, I Chaya, is bitten by a venomous creature. The Healer he finds to treat I Chaya tells him that I Chaya will die – he can either prolong his life, and again, or help him pass peacefully now. Wee Spock decides on the second option, and therefore shown he has the maturity to make the decision that awaits, whether he will follow the Vulcan path of his father, or the human path of his mother. He chooses the Vulcan path, and old Spock can return, although he teaches himself the Vulcan neck pinch first.

 A few Things of note: -

·       The story begins on the planet of the Guardian of Time, as seen in “The City On The Edge Of Forever”. This is interesting because it does show that there is follow up to what is discovered on some of the Enterprise’s missions.

·       After Spock is wiped out of the history of the Enterprise, the second in command/Science Officer is an Andorian. Andorians were first seen in “Journey to Babel”. On a practical level the use of an Andorian is probably due to the fact that D.C. Fontana wrote both “Yesteryear” and “Journey to Babel”.

·       For all that Gene Roddenberry himself discounted the idea that animated series episodes were canon, young Spock’s encounter with his taunting classmates is virtually reproduced almost exactly in the 2008 “Star Trek” franchise reboot film.

·       In “Assignment: Earth” Spock made the observation that his and Kirk’s actions in 1969 seemed to have been part of the natural course of History, thus making an inadvertent argument in favour of pre-destination. This episode seems to suggest exactly the same thing.

·       In “Journey To Babel” Amanda mentions young Spock having a pet sehlat. One of the key plot points of this story is Spock being saved by his pet sehlat I Chaya, and having to make the decision to put him out of his misery.

The Verdict

I’d venture to say that this particular story is more interesting and important than particularly enjoyable.  It’s one of the animated episodes where you can’t help wishing it had been made as an original series episode, with a full 50 minute script. The ideas are good, and the deepening of Spock’s background is a great idea, as is the use of the Guardian.  Having Spock make his future choices through the death of his sehlat though isn’t so great. The sehlat is a typical Filmation big dumb faithful animal of the sort they invariably gave to the  lead characters of their series. It’s just all over too quickly, and so can’t achieve the kind of depth it aims towards. The difficult relationship between Spock and Sarek is clearly here, but there is just no time to develop it. As I said, it’s a shame, for it is the  kind of story I could easily see having been extended, and made as an original series episode.

Episode 5) More Tribbles, More Troubles

 Briefly:-

 This is very much a sequel to the original episode, which , considering that it was written by the same writer, David Gerrold, and its origin as a proposed story for the third season of the original series is hardly surprising.

In it, the Enterprise, escorting 2 robot grain ships to Sherman’s planet, encounters a small Federation scout ship being attacked by a Klingon vessel. The Klingons accuse the pilot of ecological terrorism. When they beam the pilot on board the crew discover it is Cyrano Jones. He has a tribble predator, and also a new breed of non-reproductive tribbles. These don’t reproduce, they just get bigger and bigger. Shoot them with a phaser, and they become loads of little tribbles. The Klingons – who incidentally also have a new weapon which can disable a star ship, but also disable itself in the process – explain that Jones has infested a Klingon planet with tribbles, and stolen the glommer, the tribble predator, from them. Kirk sends them the predator, and basically all’s well that ends well, with Kirk once more being submerged by tribbles.

A Few Things of Note: -

·       This was actually a proposed episode for the third season of the original series. However Star Trek lore has it that third season producer Fred Freiberger had hated “The Trouble With Tribbles” and so vetoed it as a story.

·       The Klingon captain in this is Koloth, who was also the captain in “The Trouble With Tribbles” (although James Doohan provided Koloth’s voice in this, rather than the original actor, William Blackburn – presumably this was a cost cutting measure).

·       In “The Trouble With Tribbles” the tribbles are different colours and shades, although mostly grey. In “More Tribbles, More Troubles” they are all pink. This has been attributed to Filmation Director Hal Sutherland being colour blind.

·       We do see the two robot grain ships which seem to have similar propulsion to the Enterprise.

·       This is another sign that the enmity between the Federation and the Klingon Empire isn’t going to last forever.  

The Verdict 

If you liked “The Trouble With Tribbles” in the second season of the original series of Star Trek then there’s no reason that you wouldn’t find that this is relatively enjoyable. Mind you, what you would have made of it had you never seen the Season 2 story is another matter entirely. It’s an example of one of the things that the animated series does do rather well – in some ways it does take it for granted that you’re already a fan of the show, and you already have a decent knowledge of what has gone before in the Original Series. I’d argue that you certainly get less from “Yesteryear” and this story if you don’t.

Episode 7) The Infinite Vulcan

 Briefly:-

This one was not written by a writer from the original series. However it was written by a member of the regular cast of the original series, or at least of the seasons 2 and 3 of the original series. Walter Koenig was the only one of the regulars whose character, Chekov, did not feature in the animated series so there was no call for his vocal talents. Walter Koenig was supposedly offered the chance to write another episode, but he had found the writing of this one, with the constant rewrites and then the script revisions made by Gene Roddenberry to be a frustrating experience, so he turned the opportunity down.  

The landing party from The Enterprise are exploring the undiscovered planet Phylos. They find all the inhabitants are actually plant life. Sulu is injected with venom by a furry walking plant creature. McCoy can’t save him, but the main Phylosian species, who speak English, can, and they take Kirk and co to see their dwellings. Inside it becomes clear that this is a ruse. They have tame plant pterodactyls which attack Kirk and the others to distract them from the fact that they are stealing Spock.  

The plants are controlled by Keniclius Five, who is a giant clone of a human who plans to force the whole galaxy into a state of peace. He believes that the whole galaxy is war torn, as it was when he left Earth 250 years ago. His plan is to make a giant clone of Spock, which will aid him in his plans. This necessitates draining the mind from the original Spock, however the clone puts things to rights when he mind melds with wee original Spock. Meanwhile Kirk convinces Keniclius that the galaxy is at peace under the Federation, and a better use for his talents would be helping the Phylosians to rebuild their own civilization.

A Few Things of Note 

·       Keniclius is revealed to be a remnant from the Eugnenics Wars, and actually mentions them himself. The Eugenics Wars were mentioned in the original series first season episode “Space Seed”.

·       This episode has unfortunate echoes of “Spock’s Brain” from season 3 of the original series. Both of them feature technologically advanced aliens stealing Spock’s mind, which is clearly superior to all others round him, for their own nefarious purposes.

·       McCoy gets to treat us to a little more of his Kentucky Fried Doctor routine when he gives Kirk the recipe for a plant killer that his old grandpappy used to make himself the best garden in the whole of Georgia.

 The Verdict

Apparently this script underwent ten redrafts. Maybe this is why it has some of the most stilted dialogue of any episode so far. The vast majority of it is info-dumping exposition of the most obvious kind. That the natives of Phylos were all plants was Roddenberry’s addition to the script. Walter Koenig went on record as saying that this idea was too silly to be worth fighting about, but I tend to disagree. Although it is not necessarily a very important aspect of the story, it does add a little more texture. Visually this is pretty run of the mill animated series stuff. The alien architecture is really rather reminiscent of the alien spaceship in “Beyond the Farthest Star”, and once again the main threats are the usual Filmation variation on the dinosaur theme. Even so, at least the episode is true to the determination to avoid presenting two dimensional evil threats – for Keniclius is misguided, but his cloned huge heart does turn out to be in the right place at least.

9) Once Upon a Planet

Briefly: - 

The Enterprise has deliberately returned to the Amusement planet we encountered in the Original series episode “Shore Leave”, in a triumph of hope over experience. Thankfully this visit does not see an outbreak of the same kind of misogyny and whimsy that characterised the previous visit. What we get is this. The ‘caretaker’, whom we met at the end of “Shore Leave”, who invited the crew to spend some time on the planet and explained how it worked, is no more. He has died and the machinery that controls the planet seems to have been developing a mind of its own. Now it has no desire to serve others, and deliberately takes negative images from the minds of the crew. It also has a desire to free the Enterprise itself from being at the beck and call of its crew, and so it takes control of the Enterprise computer.

Kirk fights his way down to the control room, where the computer also has Uhura in captivity. Rather than the fallback option of talking it to death, he makes it see that it really has been a very naughty little computer, and that it should play nice. If it does, then it will attract thousands of entities from whom it will get social contact, and learn much. Ahh.

 A Few Things of Note

·       The episode is specifically a sequel to “Shore Leave” from season One of the Original Series, and it is stated specifically that everything in this story occurs on the same planet as the first.

·       The Caretaker whom we met in Shore Leave is now dead, and the machinery of the planet has taken over.

·       We see Alice and The White Rabbit from “Alice in Wonderland” who appeared in “Shore Leave” as well as the Queen of Hearts, who didn’t.

·       Kirk once again wins by besting the computer in argument. Unlike the previous 4 times in The Original Series, he does not get to talking the computer into committing suicide, just into behaving itself with visitors to the planet who want to use its facilities.  

The Verdict 

I’ll be honest, I tend to be far more interested in the stories which are connected to episodes form the original series, than those like the previous one which aren’t really. It has an inherent interest being a sort of sequel to “Shore Leave”. However it’s the kind of story that makes you remember that the Animated Series was really made for kids. The computer is one dimensionally nasty, and then its sudden conversion at the end after Kirk’s talking to is too quickly done – which I know is one of the consequences of having to tell a story in a mere 25 minutes. Let’s be honest, this one absolutely did not need to be made on the Shore Leave planet, and really and truly does not do enough with the concept to make it worth anyone’s while. Maybe just a little disappointing, even allowing for the fact that this is the Animated Series.  

10) Mudd’s Passion 

Briefly: - 

Yes, Harcourt Fenton Mudd is back! The Enterprise arrives in orbit around a mining planet whence it has been sent to arrest the old rogue, who escaped from the planet of androids in “I,Mudd” by teaching them how to play team sports, and then sneaking off when they were occupied by a baseball game. The Federation want him to stand trial for flogging fake love-crystals, which is exactly what he seems to be doing on the planet when they find him.  

Locked up in the brig on the Enterprise he persuades Christine Chapel to try one of his love crystals on Spock. Now, I don’t know that Harry Mudd ever met Nurse Chapel in either of his previous appearances, yet now not only are they on first name terms, it seems that he is privy to her secret desires. Oh well, to be fair she doesn’t make that much of a secret of them. Anyway, it seems that they work. Mudd escapes and abducts Christine, and an unconvincingly love-sick Spock follows him to the planet, along with Kirk.  

Meanwhile some of the love crystals are broken open near an air vent on the Enterprise, which suffers an outbreak of love fever. Still, Kirk and Spock capture Mudd, and the 4 beam back to the ship, as the effect of the crystals wears off, leaving the crew with an almighty hangover. Ho ho.

A Few Things Of Note

·       This is a sequel to the two ‘Mudd’ episodes of the original series – season 1’s “Mudd’s Women”, and season 2’s “I,Mudd”. It was written by Stephen Kandel, who wrote the screenplay to Roddenberry’s original story for “Mudd’s Women” and who wrote “I, Mudd”. The role of Harry Mudd was reprised by Roger C. Cartmel, who played him in the Original Series.

·       Mudd does explain how he escaped his captivity on the asteroid from “I,Mudd”. He claims that he taught the androids to play team sports, and used the opportunity while they were watching to make good his escape.

·       The episode plays on Christine Chapel’s feelings for Mr. Spock. These are clearly established in several stories of the Original series, including “The Naked Time”, “Amok Time” and “Plato’s Stepchildren”. However there is not suggestion in any of those stories that she would do what she does here, namely take away Spock’s free will through the use of the love potion even though she knows he does not feel about her the same way that she feels about him. This reflects the way that Christine is a more important character in the Animated Series (and anyone who says that this was a decision made by Gene Roddenberry in the interests of domestic harmony is a cad). She is also a far more forceful character than the frankly rather insipid Nurse Chapel of the original series. 

The Verdict 

It’s better than “Mudd’s Women” by virtue of being shorter and therefore less offensive. However it lacks the enjoyable lunacy and whackiness of “I, Mudd”. Nonetheless, the old rogue has a certain charm, and this particular episode, which seems to be one of the best remembered of the Animated series, rolls along pleasantly enough. Personally I find Leonard Nimoy’s attempt to show Spock being besotted with Christine totally unconvincing, and to be honest I think that it’s the only time in any of his Star Trek appearances that I can criticise Leonard Nimoy’s acting. Nonetheless, it’s a pleasant enough episode and worth catching if you enjoyed either of the original series Harry Mudd stories.  

Episode 11) The Terratin Incident

Briefly: -  

While the Enterprise is having a look at a burnt out supernova they begin to pick up a message which is being transmitted in a 200 year old code from a nearby planet. So they enter orbit, and when they do so they are hit by a beam of some kind of radiation. This has a double effect. It damages the dilithium crystals, and also means that the crew begin shrinking. It becomes clear that once they shrink past a certain size they will no longer be able to use the ship’s controls.

So Kirk beams down to the planet, and finds that the transporter has the effect of returning him to his normal size. We’ll examine the implications of this later on. But that’s the cure provided remarkably easily. Kirk finds a miniature city. The inhabitants  call themselves Terratin, after Terra Ten. The crew of the Enterprise can be fixed using the transporter cure, but it won’t work for the Terratins who have been like this for generations. They fired the beam at the Enterprise to get its attention, and now the Enterprise will beam the city aboard, and transport it to a planet which is more geologically stable.  

A Few Things of Note

·       Writer Paul Schneider scripted one excellent and one good episode of the original series season 1 – “Balance of Terror” and “The Squire of Gothos”. This story does not draw on the two previous ones in any way, other than being another adventure for the Enterprise crew

·       The way that the Transporter is used to return the crew to full size seems to suggest that the Transporter could have been used to bring a solution in several original series episodes when the crew were suffering from some disease or other. It was never used in this way in The Original Series, and so seems to be uncanonical.

·       The idea of crew members becoming shrunk was reused in a DS9 episode – “One Little Ship”

 The Verdict

 I will admit that this is one of the stories from the Animated Series which I remember watching as a kid. I felt that the idea of the shrunken crew trying to get to grips with the full size controls of the Enterprise was a nice idea, and this is one of the Animated stories which I can see having formed the basis of an original series episode. Or rather I can’t, but only because the effects, and building giant sets to make normal sized actors appear tiny would probably have been cost prohibitive.

However. . .

The use of the transporter to return them to their full size begs some questions. If I understood this correctly, the transporter retains a memory them from the first time they used it. In which case, they could have used it for a cure for all ills. In the original series any crew member with a disease should have been shoved through it – voila, instant cure. Not only that too – surely by the end of the voyage, a crew member could use it and voila – five years younger. In fact, couldn’t transporters be used to being a kind of immortality? Which is probably why they never went down this route with the transporters in the original series. It’s a problem, and may be one of the reasons why, as whole, the animated series is not officially regarded as canon, even though it gave us Kirk’s middle name.

Episode 12) The Time Trap

Briefly: -

This one is a wee bit of an extravaganza. It’s based on the Bermuda Triangle, which was very big in the 1970s. Well, not the Triangle, but public fascination with it. The Enterprise enters the Delta Triangle, where many starships have just disappeared beyond all trace, and finds a Klingon ambush waiting for it. An ion storm strikes, and the Enterprise and one of the Klingon ships is drawn into a time/space portal, and they end  up in another dimension. It appears to be a graveyard for lost ships, and surprisingly the descendants of the crews of the ships are still alive. Whatever their differences might have been in the past these crews appear to have formed an alliance, and their own government.

 The crew discover that the Enterprise’s dilithium crystals will soon disintegrate. The only way that they can try to escape back through the portal is to form a temporary alliance with the Klingon ship that came through the portal with them. They do that, despite some Klingon treachery.

A Few Things Of Note 

·       The Klingon commander is Kor from the original series episode “Errand of Mercy”, although not voiced by John Colicos who played him in the original series.

·       Once again the Klingons are dressed in pink in the animated series. This is explained by the fact that the man responsible for deciding the colours they were at Filmation was apparently colour blind, and would see grey as pink. Hence the pink tribbles in an earlier episode.

·       One of the leaders of the trapped beings appears to be an Orion slave girl, of the type seen in “The Cage/Menagerie” and “Whom The Gods Destroy”. Other beings we see who appeared in the original series are a Vulcan, an Andorian, a Tellarite both from “Journey to Babel” and a creature who resembles the Gorn captain from “Arena”

·       The name of Kor’s ship is here given as the Klothos for the first time, and this is a fact that gets repeated in DS9.

·       This is the last Animated series story to feature Klingons, and so it is the last time that the original humanoid Klingons feature – until Trials and Tribble-ations, anyway.  

The Verdict 

This is one of those animated series stories which, while it probably wouldn’t quite work so well as a live action 50 minute episode, works well as a 25 minute animated one, probably because it understands exactly what the point of the story is, and doesn’t try to go beyond the limits of this particular story format. The old ships we see are rather fun, and it was interesting to see so many familiar Star Trek original series alien races too. I mean, if we’re being picky, this is not the most thoughtful item on the menu, but then the animated series stories aren’t as a rule, and if you consider it as an animated episode, then it’s perfectly fine.

Episode 14) The Slaver Weapon

Briefly: -  

I’m very aware of Larry Niven’s work, but I have never read any of his ‘Slaver’ works, but do you know what? I don’t think it matters. This is one which starts with an interesting idea, and amazingly manages to sustain it for the whole episode. It starts with the Enterprise’s shuttlecraft Copernicus  trying to deliver a stasis box. This is where the crossover with Slaver culture comes. In this story, the Slavers are long gone, but their boxes were used to carry either technology or data, either of which would probably be extremely valuable. They also have the property of being able to detect each other, and the shuttlecraft soon sees that another is on a nearby planet.  

Last time out we had a water world, this time out it’s an ice world. There you go. When the shuttlecraft land the crew – Spock, Sulu and Uhura, are captured by the Kzinti. These are a race of cat men, who wear pink suits, courtesy, one suspects, of the colourblind Hal Sutherland. They have their own empty box which they are using to find other boxes. They aren’t interested in anything other than Slaver weapons. When they open the box the landing crew are carrying they find, amongst other things, a device they suspect may be a weapon. When you push the right button the weapon changes shape, and in different shapes it has different powers. All looks bad for a while, for although the crew escape with the weapon, they are recaptured, and it is taken. However on one setting the Kzinti find a Slaver war computer, which demands code words that they cannot provide. So the weapon gives them a setting they think they want, but in reality it is a self-destruct, which takes both weapon and Kzinti with it.  

A Few Things of Note 

·       This specifically links the Star Trek mythos with Larry Niven’s own “Slaver” mythos.

·       The episode does not feature Captain Kirk apart from his usual introduction. This was the first episode of Star Trek without Kirk since “The Cage”, and when footage from that story was first used it was incorporated into “The Menagerie” which did feature Kirk.  

The Verdict 

It’s a bit of an oddity this one, what with the crossover with Slavers, and the complete lack of William Shatner. Yet as a one off, it really is none the worse for it. The climax actually works rather better than many episodes of the animated series have. And the fact that it is not the crew themselves who foil the dastardly plans of the Kzinti is rather refreshing. Yes, ok, the Kzinti themselves are rather flat and uninteresting – but then I suppose that with only 25 minutes of screenplay it isn’t easy depicting interesting and three dimensional alien races.

21) How Sharper Than A Serpent’s Tooth 

Briefly: -   

The Enterprise is immobilized by a strangely designed gigantic ship that resembles a winged snake. The inhabitant of the ship claims that it is Kulkulkan, the ancient God of the Mayans. Shades of “Who Mourns for Adonais?” Kulkulkan wants the crew to worship him, and when they don’t seem to happy about this prospect he transports Kirk, McCoy and Scotty aboard his ship, which seems like a great ancient city. Kulkulkan says he will appear to them when they have solved the riddle of the city. The crew work out that there are elements of many Earth cultures combined in the city – probably because Kulkulkan may have interacted with many cultures on Earth but none of them received the whole picture. So none of them ever built what was needed to signal him to come back because they were ready for him.  

There’s a huge Mayan type pyramid at the centre of the city, and Kirk climbs it  to the top, and figures out how to use the sun to signal for Kulkulkan. It basically involves twisting huge statues with the heads of snakes towards the top of the pyramid. This focuses the sunlight, and the feathered serpent appears, and at the same time the buildings of the city seem to disappear. It isn’t really clear what the point of this is, but Kulkulcan seems happy with it. There  are animals of many species being kept in glass cages all around them. Kulkulkan tells them his reason for bringing them there. He’s been missing out on a bit of worship recently, and so Kirk and the others will make with the praise. Kirk says thanks for the offer, but those days are gone, buster.  

Meanwhile, back on the ship, clever old Spock has figured out how to set the Enterprise free from Kulkulkan’s clutches. This enrages Kulkulkan, who is peed off already by Kirk’s distinct lack of worship, and he decides he is going to destroy the Enterprise. To take his mind off this Kirk and McCoy start freeing the animals from the cages, while Spock fires on Kulkulkan’s ship with the Enterprise’s phaser banks. One of the aliens life forms now freed on Kulkulkan’s ship, a sort of big cat creature, goes for the feathered serpent, but Kirk sedates it with a tranquilliser. This earns him enough respect for Kulkulkan to listen to him while he does his Jedi-like mind thing of talking powerful aliens out of their original purpose and getting them to leave quietly in peace.

A Few Things to take note of

 ·       Writer Russell Bates is a Kiowa Native American, which may be why we have a rare example of a Native American crew member, Dawson Walking Bear in this story. David Wise was brought in to co-write the episode since he had previously been an animator. DC Fontana very much wanted an American Indian themed story. In season 3 of the original series, “The Paradise Syndrome” while set on an alien planet had some obvious parallels with Native American culture – or Hollywood’s perception of it.

·       Similarities to “Who Mourns for Adonais?” from season 2 of the original series were deliberate. The story was made a short while after the death of Gene L. Coon, and writer Russell Bates deliberately used Coon’s story as a model as a tribute.

·       Originally the Kulkulkan figure was to have been The Thunderbird, from Native American rather than meso-American legend.

·       More so even than previous stories such as “Who Mourns for Adonais”, the story also seems to echo some of the theories in the works of Erich von Daniken.

·       Like “Bem” this was written but not selected for the first season.

·       Although they don’t receive a name check, amongst Kulkulkan’s caged animals are tribbles and a horta.

·       If you include “The Cage”, then this was Spock’s 100^th appearance. 

The Verdict

You know, when I first watched this story when I was all of 10 years old I loved it. Absolutely loved it. It was my favourite animated series episode by a country mile. Probably still is. It helps, mind you, that I really liked “Who Mourns for Adonais?” for all its faults. For me, appearance wise Kulkulkan looks by far the most effective alien/monster in the whole series – and I don’t have any kind of phobia about snakes either. This makes a point about what makes this story better than so much of what we’ve seen in the animated series – it looks so much better for large parts of it. Kulkulkan’s ship is a nice idea, as is the representation of the city. As for the plot – well, essentially it IS “Who Mourns for Adonis?” so if there’s no great originality there, at least I know that it works to my satisfaction, which is something.  

The only reason I couldn’t see this one having been made as an original series episode is the budget. I don’t think they’d have been able to make such an effective city set, and I don’t think they would have been able to realise Kulkulkan’s ship half so well. Heaven alone knows how they would have done Kulkulkan himself. 

Still a pleasure to watch all over again.  

22) The Counter Clock Incident 

Briefly: -

Or as we might all this story, “The Deadly Years” in reverse. We begin with two very important passengers aboard the Enterprise. They are Robert April, the first ever captain of the Enterprise, and his missus, Sarah. They are going to a diplomatic meeting on the planet Babel, where he will be undergoing an official retirement ceremony. A ship flies past the Enterprise at unimaginable speeds, and seems headed straight into a supernova. The Enterprise grabs it with a tractor beam, but this has the effect of pulling both ships into the supernova, and they fly through it, emerging in a parallel universe. The difference between this one and our own is that time flows backwards in this universe, and seemingly far more quickly than our own. 

The pilot of the other ship, called Karla Five, takes them to a planet called Arret, and he and her much older son try to help them. Basically by the time they’ve worked out how to get back to our universe, the crew have regressed to children and babies, and so it’s down to Bob and Sarah to pilot the Enterprise through. When they’ve safely done that they use the cop out of transporter to return the crew to the age they were when the episode began. Sarah raises the possibility that they could remain at the much younger age they have regressed to , but wise old Robert says that they have had such a great and successful life together it would be greedy and wrong to try to have another free go, and they too undergo the transporter cure.

A Few Things to take note of

 ·       This is the last ever transmitted edition of the Enterprise’s original 5 year mission.

·       Gene Roddenberry had vetoed Filmation’s wish for the regular crew to be accompanied by cadets – child crew members. With the crew becoming children again, this is an oblique nod to that idea.

·       The name Robert April was Gene Roddenberry’s creation. He had originally considered using this as the name for the captain of the Enterprise, before settling on Christopher Pike for “The Cage”. The writer checked “The Menagerie” carefully to make sure that there was not even as much as a suggestion that Pike was the first ever captain of the Enterprise. In subsequent years it has become canon that April was the first captain of the Enterprise before being succeeded by Pike, who in turn was succeeded by Kirk.

·       April is depicted wearing a dress uniform, similar to those worn by the Enterprise crew and Star Fleet officers on official occasions in several original series stories.

·       The last word ever delivered on screen during the original 5 year mission of the Enterprise was not uttered by a member of the crew, but by Sarah April.

·       Babel is a reference to the planet to which a party of ambassadors is heading in the season 2 episode “Journey to Babel”.

·       This is not the first alternative universe. One was featured in season one of the original series in “The Alternative Factor”

·       This episode seems to set compulsory retirement age for Star Fleet at 75. One wonders whether this would be just for human beings, since Vulcans, for example, age more slowly than humans.  

The Verdict 

History, and critical opinion, has not been kind to this particular episode. Despite the general approval for the inclusion and foregrounding of Robert April, the whole supernova gateway idea is a difficult one to swallow, especially when you’re asked to wash it down with – the parallel universe has time working backwards – and – the closer you get to going back through the supernova, the more quickly time goes backwards. Add to this that the transporter once again becomes the panacea, the cure for all ills, and what you’re left with is an episode for which it is absolutely fatal if you stop to think through what it is actually saying.

That wasn’t quite so much as a problem for me when I first watched it when I was 10 – although I do remember wondering who this April bloke was considering that I knew that Chris Pike had been captain before James Kirk. But I have to admit it, for all the fact that this story is arrant nonsense, I still rather enjoyed it, even though, with hindsight, it would have been better if the previous episode had been the last televised adventure of the original 5 year mission.  

The Animated Series: Overview

 It is difficult to write at any length about the Animated Series without restating the obvious. So apologies if it comes across as this is what I’m doing. Here we go:- 

·       The Animated series was aimed at children, while the original series was not specifically aimed at children.

This is not a complete negative, for it does mean that the Kirk romance elements which get in the way of a significant number of original series stories are just not there. It is also noticeable that to some extent the Animated series is far less overtly misogynistic than its live action predecessor. Nubile scantily clad women are not scattered throughout the series with the same gratuitous abandon. On the other hand, although Uhura does in “The Lorelei Signal” and “Once Upon A Planet” get to go through her paces a little more, by and large this is still a male -dominated Galaxy. However you can’t say that the animated series is any worse in this respect than the original series.  

The plots are, by and large relatively simplistic. Moral arguments usually boil down to the idea that its’ nice to be nice, and it’s not nice to be nasty. I can’t argue with that, but it’s an argument that doesn’t exactly tax the intellect. Many episodes do contain a chase and an attack by monsters – often the same monster.  

Partly this is due to the fact that since this is a cartoon aimed at children it has a 25 minute format, standard for a child’s cartoon show. That’s all well and good, but it creates a problem, inasmuch as the writers have still tried to comply with the traditional 4 act format. As a result a lot of the resolutions are sudden and/or rushed, and can appear to be inadequately prepared for or thought through. It’s ironic that it would take five years between the first showing of the “Counter Clock Incident” and the premiere of Star Trek The Motion Picture, and then when it was shown one of the most telling criticisms of it was that it felt like a 45 minute story stretched to twice its intended lifespan – in many ways the opposite of the Animated series episodes. 

·       This is an animated series, while the original series was live action.

It isn’t so much of a problem that this is an animated series, in fact you can argue that being an animated series the writers had far more scope to be creative, since the animators could pretty much realise whatever they came up with – there was no extra cost in terms of special effects.  

The problem really comes with it being a Filmation series. Filmation cartoons look cheap, largely because they were made cheaply. Their big boast at the time was that Filmation cartoons were actually made in the USA, and in order for them to compete with their competitors who had their cartoons animated in other countries where they could be made more cheaply, then the Filmation way was to cut corners wherever they could be cut. Thus the same sequences of animation do tend to be used over and over again. Filmation animation also has a jerky quality to it. 

On the positive side , the main characters, Kirk, Spock and Bones are all recognisable as who they are meant to be, as is Sulu. Scotty and Uhura are far less so. Having the original actors back to provide the voices works well too, although the fact that James Doohan provides a huge number of the other voices does give them a very samey, unmemorable quality. I’m not criticising his vocal or acting talents, but it works out that the most memorable guest characters are those who appeared in the original series – Harry Mudd and Cyrano Jones.

·       Many of the animated series writers had already written for the original series 

Not only that, but DC Fontana acted as script editor for the majority of episodes, and even wrote one of the best, “Yesteryear”. Admittedly, some of the stories, and even some of the ideas upon which the stories were based weren’t very good. However even in the most lacklustre stories I think you’d have to admit that the spirit of the original series is present. How many times do episodes end with the Enterprise blasting baddies out of existence? No, the emphasis, just as with the original series, is in fostering peace and greater understanding between sentient races.  

Last words 

I doubt that I have anything especially original to say about why Star Trek is still being watched, talked and written about after 50 years. I think you can sum it up as being popular due to a number of factors:- 

·       It wasn’t brainless. Many of its plots had holes, some of which were big enough to fly a doomsday machine through, but it almost always had ideas. Star Trek was very, very rarely about the Enterprise and its crew fighting against monsters and destroying them because that is what you are supposed to do with monsters. While if you compare it with contemporary shows, like those being produced by Irwin Allen for example, well, both “Lost In Space” and “Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea” were both often about monster fighting, because that’s what you did with monsters.

·       It wasn’t heartless. While it is often paternalistic or even condescending towards the alien societies it portrays, there is usually a value placed on life, any form of life (except perhaps for red shirted crewmen), and usually at least an attempt to reach out and understand rather than destroy.

·       It wasn’t pointless. Star Trek often ‘did’ issues. Granted, often it did them heavy handedly, preachily, or just plain badly, but the fact that it tried to examine them in the first place made it far better than a lot of its contemporaries, and is surely one of the reasons why we still find it interesting today.

·       It wasn’t characterless. I think you can argue that right from the start the series understood that the heart of the show was the relationship between Kirk and Spock, and then later on Kirk Spock and Bones. All truly good drama is an exploration of characters and relationships, and the three principles, ably supported by Scotty, Sulu, Uhura and later on Chekov, were interesting and likeable. It’s significant that all were asked to return for the films.