Tessa  0:17  
Welcome to Sam watch Star Trek. The Rip off podcast comes in a podcast that now is a spin off podcast where I asked Sam questions about episodes of Star Trek that we watched this week. I'm your host, Tessa and with me is Sam.

Sam  0:33  
That's right, she ripped off my spin on podcast. Also, we're going to find out this week, how little I remember from one day to the next, this will be embarrassing.

Tessa  0:45  
So we are layering my last watch with Sam's watch of the original series of Star Trek. Now, Sam, you talked about the first season of the original series back in episode 47. Do you want to give our listeners a quick recap of the stuff that you remember from seasons one and two since we're picking up at the beginning of season three?

Sam  1:11  
Well, one thing that I do remember is that actually, we're layering our watch of The X Files with last and then Star Trek. I mean, I want to make sure we don't lose the plot on this one. We didn't talk about this on Tesla watches last but we watched X Files all the way up to the feature film, which Tessa did talk about a monkey. Then we started watching last and we've kind of been alternating Star Trek. What do I remember? A everything I knew from pop culture is true. Kirk's a horndog Spock and bones are the men who love him. Sooloos Great. Scotties Great. Chekhov has weird, Davy Jones hasn't been to the barber and like forever haircut. Her is great Tribbles Klingons Klingons.

Tessa  2:10  
If you want to hear more of Sam's take on the first season of Star Trek, the original series, go back and listen to it on episode 47. Now, one thing to make very clear, before we continue is that you are not watching every single episode of the series. I have artfully selected certain episodes for you to watch, because you said you wouldn't watch all of them. Is that correct?

Sam  2:36  
Yes. I mean, they're like 30 Plus seasons of Star Trek at this point. I just don't know that I'm going to live that long. And, you know, to be honest, when we watch The X Files, I cut a few episodes here and there based on whether or not they were good. Now, you know, most of the episodes of The X Files from season one through five are good. It's not to the later ones where we're going to start cutting things out. But again, I'll just say this was an experience and then continues to be one where everything I know about this show is pretty much confirmed. There are a few pop culture franchises that exist in the pop culture, popular consciousness than Star Trek. I can't think of one that is more ubiquitous than that. Perhaps even more so than Star Wars.

Tessa  3:28  
It's true. Why did it take you so long to watch Star Trek again? nerd stuff. Alright, so we watched two episodes this week from season three of the original series. The first episode we watched was the enterprise incident written by DC Fontana, who most of you will recognize as a writer on many many, many, many, many episodes of Star Trek and also other television shows of the time. It was directed by John Meredith Lucas first broadcast on September 27 1968. Real brief summary. Kirk behaves irrationally taking the enterprise into the neutral zone between the Romulan Empire and the Federation. The Enterprise is surrounded by Romulan ships and their commander and unnamed female Romulan accuses Herc and crew of espionage. So, first of all, what was your take on this episode? The Enterprise incident?

Sam  4:23  
You mean? More irrationally? Right? Well,

Tessa  4:28  
rationally enough that McCoy is concerned at the beginning of the episode. Sure.

Sam  4:32  
Yeah. And if McCoy is concerned, apparently, something is wrong. He's very concerned. He's very concerned. He has his concern face and everything and he's angry. He gets annoyed. He gets annoyed and flustered when he's angry. It's, you know, it's very endearing. I mean, it was obvious from the very beginning that this is a thing. This is a plot, right? This is a plan. And either McCoy is doing a very good Good acting Java, he's not in on it. Of course, the emotional range of a tick, Spock is in on it because he can keep a secret. So I kind of knew that to go in with it. It was it was fun. It was it was a good app, things happened. You know, for a show that isn't that is aggressively not serialized. This felt like we were moving somewhere with the main plot such that there is one right, which is, you know, this this whole Romulan relationship. So it was cool to see that. From the outset. I know, this isn't the premiere. It's like the second episode of season three. But it was good to see that to start with, and feel like there's some kind of through line in the series, which is another thing that kept me from it for very, very long. Just the fact that it's so episodic and I like serialized stories.

Tessa  5:51  
The other thing that's introduced in this episode that is of course, important in Star Trek lore is the cloaking device that Kirk and Spock and crew are after. It turns out that the Romulans have made a way to cloak their ships. We see them appear out of thin air, it seems like in space. What did you think about the cloaking device? And the whole plan to steal it it up to and including Kirk doing Romulan face? Is that is that culturally appropriative?

Sam  6:25  
Well, okay, so Starfleet is allegedly peaceful. This series is allegedly utopian. There are laws about first contact and blah, blah, blah Star Trek. They straight up went and stole that cloaking device from the Romulans. They did a bad and it's a bad that we don't think is a bad because they're the good guys. And you know, we don't really think about that probably much in the 60s. If they made this today. This would have a lot more nuance, we'd spend an entire season looking at it from the Romulans point of view. And by the end of it, we would be convinced that they aren't the bad guys. In fact, who are the bad guys? Really? This bothered me? The fact that Starfleet got a major advancement from straight up thievery. Honey trappin. Romulan facing thievery. These are the good guys were supposed to be okay with this.

Tessa  7:31  
Would it make it better if I told you that we conveniently forget that Kirk makes off with the cloaking device by the end of this episode. And the Federation never figures out how to develop this technology for themselves.

Sam  7:43  
So they're bad and stupid.

Tessa  7:46  
What do you think about the Cold War implications of this episode?

Sam  7:51  
Yeah, so you the Soviets, they're just like us they can be tricked by a pretty faces. Well, I like this better when it was called The Spy Who Loved Me. Well,

Tessa  8:01  
and a important integral part of the plan is in fact, Spock's very strange seduction of the Romulan commander. What did you think about the Romulan commander who is a woman but we don't ever get a name despite the fact that the episode is written by DC Fontana, who is in fact a woman and Spock? Who honestly doesn't seem like he's interested in being there.

Sam  8:28  
This mating ritual is in fact, weird. The finger touching? Yeah, there was. I mean, there was finger banging, but it's not what you think. Vulcans doing. Ammori is weird.

Tessa  8:50  
What did you think about Kirk's apparent death halfway through the episode, and the ways in which the first part of the episode tries to convince us that he's just like, lost his mind that he's mad with power? Because it really does try to straightforward sell us on that until it's like oh, yeah, actually, he's not dead. You

Sam  9:09  
remember that episode of How I Met Your Mother? The remember the one you know the one? The one in the kitchen? The one in the coffee shop? Yes. Yeah, it's only five that that jokes only funny if a she's never heard a joke before. Right? Have we ever done the I've taken her drug that slows my heartbeat to near death? We literally watched something with that this morning.

Tessa  9:37  
Even the first time Kirk has done it. Yeah,

Sam  9:41  
I mean like Yeah, is this like the first time this has ever happened on TV ever? Because if not, of course he's not dead. What are we gonna do get the other guy back? No. We are going to get the other guy back on what Paramount plus or whatever.

Tessa  9:56  
It's called This Week. strange new world. Yeah, whatever. Yeah, correct. It's not going to die, whatever. But he is going to give nurse chapel of surprise in the med bay. And not his usual surprise in the Back Bay. Alright, and finally, what did you think about Scottie as the MVP this week when he was in command of the enterprise and absolutely refuse to believe that Kirk had engaged in espionage and refuse to give over command of the enterprise to the Romulan commander? Listen,

Sam  10:27  
there are certain immutable rules that you know about Star Trek, even if you've never seen an episode of Star Trek. Kirk is a horndog. Spock is gonna say something about logic. Bones is gonna compare himself to another profession that he is not Sulu is gonna be silly. And any scene that Scott is in, he is the MVP. I'm so happy he's here.

Tessa  10:51  
Alright, and the other episode we watch this week is and the children shall lead, which was written by Edward J. Lascaux and directed by Marvin Chomsky. I've no idea if he's related to the other Chomsky. The Enterprise investigates the sudden silence of a colony. When they arrived, they find that a mysterious force has driven all the adults to suicide and given the children who are seemingly unaffected by their parents deaths, incredible powers, the children take over the ship and Kirk and Spock must free their minds from telepathic control. So, public opinion is very divided about this episode. It has been listed as one of the worst episodes in the original series. But people really really love a lot of the scenes between Kirk and Spock in this episode. It has also been listed as one of the creepiest episodes of the original series. What was your reaction to this episode, Sam?

Sam  11:45  
So yeah, so I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that this is inspired by the British film. I believe it's British Village of the Damned, which I haven't seen. But I assume this is based off of it. I mean, this is this is creepy kid. Pop culture, right. It's children in the corn. You know? And so, except these kids are super creepy. Super creepy, especially the tall ginger kid. Oh my god. Creepy.

Tessa  12:17  
That's so funny story. The tall ginger kid. Craig Hundley, who plays Tommy, he actually grew up to become a composer and actually composed a lot of the score for the Star Trek films. But you find him creepy in this is it? Is it the weird ritual that they do, including that motion that they make when they're like doing their power? Which looks like they're banging on a table? Or is it just the fact that their children,

Sam  12:45  
they have to be the universe's worst Rock Paper Scissors players because they always throw rock. Like all you got to do is hit him with paper and it's over. That's what it looks like to me. I'm like, rock papers. Okay, that's nope, nope. What about this time? Nope. No, they're creepy because the creepy they were never not going to be creepy. They could have been the sweetest children in the world and they would have been creepy. Okay, but here's the thing. That's why they're creepy. The the whole like, Rock Paper Scissors thing? I don't really care. That's fine. The dude they summon though wearing that that weird shirt. like that at all. That's creepy. That's nightmare fuel. That's the evil spirit that's possessing them.

Tessa  13:33  
So fun story. The this is actually this is this is a this is a piece of trivia that I kind of knew. But I had to look up for this. And it's fascinating to me. So the spirit that they summon the Gorgon is actually what it's called, is played by Melvin Belli who was a famous lawyer in Hollywood, who represented a lot of celebrities like Errol Flynn, The Rolling Stones, Muhammad Ali, and, and he represented Jack Ruby, who killed Lee Harvey Oswald. And one of his kids is one of the children.

Sam  14:06  
The 60s were weird. Bring on the eight hour cut of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, because that's what this is. Right? Everything's connected. Yeah. So it's not it's really not surprising at all.

Tessa  14:17  
So, before I move on, which child is creepy, or Tommy or Mary? Tommy no

Sam  14:23  
doubt.

Tessa  14:24  
Okay. So the children are controlling the crew through telepathy. And I was a little confused during this episode. We talked about this a little bit. Are they seeing their fears? Or are they seeing like, what what? How at first I thought they were just showing the crew their worst fears. But it seems like they're also showing their crew the crew like, like most of the crew thinks that they're still orbiting around the planet when they're actually going somewhere else. How do you think that this works?

Sam  14:52  
So there there are two levels, right? There's like the there's like the, you know, low to medium intensity and then the His high intensity when they hit Sulu the first time, right? He just is convinced that he's, you know, orbiting the planet. That's what they said, you're still orbiting the planet. And so he orbits the planet, but we can see that they're going away. This is very similar to the way that they take over the people down in transportation engineering, right in and Scott gets, you know, mugged by one of those guys. They're clearly not afraid. They're just controlled, right? So there's like a low intensity setting. And we know there's a higher intensity setting and we've seen it on other people. But the real test here is when Sulu gets hit with the higher intensity, it's no longer that he thinks he's going around the planet. He is trying to pilot the enterprise through giant intergalactic space swords and knives. And, and I mean, that's his greatest fear that he cannot do his job well, that's it that's that's what it is low and high settings.

Tessa  16:02  
What did you think about what oversaw

Sam  16:06  
right? So they hit her with the high octane stuff immediately, right? She was Yeah, yeah, she was she was it not now, US said at the time that we watched it, that oh, she's afraid of mortality. Now by that they straight up told us that are that the main woman in this show, her main fear is not being pretty anymore because she's old. You know, it's predictable. You know, I give as little credit to the writers being able to write women well in this show as the material in or hers. bottom half, right? Ain't there? Not there? It's barely there. It only covers what you need to cover get it past standards and practices. That's it. And by the way, and by the way, kit, by the way, I'm not done in these episodes. We saw straight up but right. We straight up saw that was the that was the Romulan, right. Yeah, she's she's married whole she's wearing tights, but we saw straight up but okay. I just want to point out it was it aired on NBC and made by CBS what was the deal? We talked about this. The first two seasons of this are produced by Desi Lu right, which is Desi Arnaz, and Lucille Ball. But the third season is produced by Paramount, which is CBS now it was distributed on NBC, but I just want to point out here, straight up, but at the same time that Tommy and Dickie smothers are being censored by CBS, they aired on CBS for talking about the Vietnam War. That's right kids. Back in the 60s, We'd rather see but then talk about the war. My hard times change.

Tessa  17:56  
I was gonna say it's like the opposite. Now. It is opposite now. Like, we will watch a straight up we're in a Marvel movie, but God forbid we have a sex scene or a but but no, it's not. It's Sophia. Alright, what did you think about the emotional center of this episode, which is Spock is the first one to throw off the telepathic control, he realizes that something is going on on the bridge, probably because he's a Vulcan, and he has telepathic powers. He immediately grabs Kirk and says, Captain, we have to get off this bridge. And we get this very emotional scene in the turbolift. Because Kirk is facing he's basically having an anxiety attack. He's facing his own fear about not being good enough to be captain. And we see Spock comfort him and call him. Jim, what did you think about the relationship between Kirk and Spock in this episode?

Sam  18:49  
You kind of know this going in if you paid attention to the zeitgeist at all. All right. If the danger of the week is like a straight up attack, that's going to be a team effort, right? Everybody plays the role. We're all in this together. If somebody needs to be sexed up to to win, yes. And in Kirk. So in a way, you know, the first episode that we watched this week is an exception to the rule, which is one of the things that made it interesting, if not weird. If you need somebody to be healed to be doctored, of course, you're going to go to bones. But if you need mine stuff for blood stuff, you got a half human on board. So you can just figure this out, right? You know, one of the things about TV writing is you write a problem and then you write how to fix it. And so, you know, Spock is a convenient out for many things. So mind control, obviously, it's going to be him who fixes it. That's great. I do love that Kirk stood no match for them. Like he immediately caved. Like, the writers of the show are like, Well, yeah, he's the captain. He's the main character and he's good at this. But I mean, he has some flaws. Yeah, that's it.

Tessa  20:05  
So no comment on Spock tenderly holding him in the turbolift and letting him cry into its uniform.

Sam  20:11  
Okay, we just, you know, and I don't think we talked about this for season one. We didn't talk about season two because we weren't doing this yet, but I just need you to know how little I am invested in the ship slash SNESs of the originals. I don't care. I don't care does nothing for me. I get it. They all love each other. Get a room. Okay. I don't care. But yeah, I saw it.

Tessa  20:40  
Alright. And then finally, for this episode, or for this particular Trek episode. How did you feel about McCoy? Who is really only in two scenes of this episode, he's at the beginning telling Kirk, you can't mess with these child's children's psychology. They're all in shock. You can't confront them or they'll they might be permanently damaged to the end where he walks in and they're all crying because Kirk has, has shown them the bodies of their dead parents in complete opposition to what McCoy said to do. And McCoys. Like you fix them. We can talk to them now about it.

Sam  21:13  
I like how he was so happy. They were traumatized. Because I mean, I it was consistent. His whole thing was they need to be traumatized, or they won't heal. If they're not traumatized long enough. That's where they get permanently messed up. Right. And and you know, he's probably right about that. I, I guess I mean, it's no more wrong than anything else. We've seen. The him it, Jim. I'm a doctor, not a child psychologist. Except he plays one on TV because this is a TV show. Yeah, I mean, I thought that was interesting. It was like, every time he was on screen this episode, he was like, you have to traumatize them. They have to face the truth. You can't keep it from them. They're not reacting. That's weird. They're a little sociopath. Except he didn't say that part. That's the that's the part. You know. That's the quiet part. Right? Like, if they're not traumatized, they have issues. Well, of course, they have issues because they've been taken over by this weird lawyer, dude. I mean, these episodes were fun. What can I say? I mean,

Tessa  22:17  
we have Romulan, a female Romulan commander, with bought. All right. Finally, Star Trek isn't serialized, like you mentioned. But I do think that by the time we get to the beginning of season three, we have some through lines as far as characters go like these characters have come a long way since we first saw them in season one. How do you feel about where they are here at the beginning of season three?

Sam  22:42  
I think in these first two episodes of season three, we haven't seen bones is uniform is smock uniform. Like we've just seen the regular shirt. And I gotta tell you, I miss the smock. That, you know, for continuity sake, I need to see the smock again, smock smock smock there, I said it three times. Sounds like Spock. Anyway. Yeah, I mean, I do appreciate that. I feel like they know what they're doing. Now, one of the other good things about these episodes, and I do think they still I mean, ideally, these should be a tight 45. Right? They're still a little bit over 15 minutes. But I think even in the production, they've been cut down a couple of minutes, I'd have to go back and look at that. But in any case, they're doing a lot better in these first two episodes of actually writing to the time that they had. Because that was my main complaint, as you know, in the first two seasons is, you know, while I enjoy the show, I enjoy the idea I enjoy the plots of most of the episodes. They don't need the time that they had. So perhaps the best thing about these two episodes is the fact that they did use all the time that they had in a productive way. And so of course, because I've seen a television show, they found their groove in this season, so they get canceled at the end. Of course, of course. Of course. This could have been a Netflix show it had three seats. It had three seasons, they finally figured out what they were going to do when they got canceled. Wait, are they using the original series as their model at Netflix? Because you probably shouldn't do that.

Tessa  24:18  
Join us next time for more Sam watch Star Trek. We will be talking about the season three episodes day of the dove and for the world is hollow and I have touched the sky. You can find Sam on Twitter at cm underscore Morris nine and you can find me on Twitter at suela. Tessa Swehla spelled SW e HLA. Until next time, live long and prosper.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai