Mudd's Women: Season One Episode Six

Here comes Mudd's Women, and that is a good title for this episode because basically Our Man Mudd just rips it up across this episode. It also moves pretty slowly for the first half, focusing mainly on the confusing legal travails of Our Man Mudd, then suddenly kicks into high gear and juggles thirty plots at once. Let's dive in!
The Enterprise (including the occasional appearance by Uhura, so, that's awesome) is chasing an unregistered ship through an asteroid belt! So, immediately we are in the ACTION. Both ships get messed up pretty bad by the asteroids and stuff (the science of this was hard for me to follow, not because it was unclear, but because I felt like I got it). They beam aboard the captain of that ship, and he is an incredible, huge, hairy Irish beast of a man with a curly mustache and a silver tongue. He is Our Man Mudd, but shhh he's pretending his name is Leo Francis Walsh. He's also dressed like a pirate! No, really:

Mudd explains that there are three other individuals on his ship, but they're not his crew dot dot dot THEY'RE HIS CARGO. If I were Leon Phelps (and I am), I would say "Ooh, it's a lady!" I would say it again two more times, because they're three ladies. And immediately all the bros on the ship are left drooling all over the ladies, except for Spock who currently has two emotions: Not Into These Ladies ~and~ Pissed at The Bros For Being Into These Ladies. Plus Sulu is not into them because he's looking at Our Man Mudd and thinking "More Cushion for the Pushin'" and "Where Can I Get A Sweet Hat Like That?"
It's established that these ladies are with Mudd consensually, and they're looking to marry dudes and so Mudd finds dudes in search of ladies to marry, and gets the dudes to pay for this, and this sounds creepy but is basically space prostitution, which is NOT YET LEGAL/SAFE, which is disappointing. This show was made in 1966 - are there episodes about back-galaxy space-bortions? You know? But there's something weird about the ladies, because they're supposed to refuse medical examinations (PS it is suggested that they might be forced to undergo medical exams, which IS THERE NO CONSTITUTION IN SPACE OR WHAT?). So, keep an eye on that.
We're then subjected to a Space Kangaroo Court, where Our Man Mudd is subjected to a Lie Detector Test while being tried. This seems unreasonable. His real name is revealed, as is the fact that he has a criminal record. He's basically a galaxy-trotting ne'er-do-well named Harcourt Fenton Mudd, which in my book is no crime at all. They decide to keep him locked up, which is fine by him because it's pretty lax security on the Enterprise, and also he's got a secret plan going with The Ladies. One of The Ladies, Eve, is totally head over heels for Kirk (OBVIOUSLY) and is not sure she wants to go through with the schemes. Trust Our Mann Mudd, Eve. He knows what he's doing.

As luck would have it, the Enterprise is badly in need of some dilithium crystals (referred to on this episode as "lithium crystals" which sounds like something a character on Breaking Bad would get addicted to), and Our Man Mudd promises the crew that the dudes who are gonna marry The Ladies have tons of dilithium. Just tons of the stuff, hint hint. Our Man Mudd bangs out a deal with the miners before Kirk even knows what's happening. And so here come the miners!
But first, The Ladies are chilling in Our Man Mudd's cabin (chilled-out lockdown environment, Kirk) and they cannot find their pills! What kind of pills? The kind of pills that keep the ladies from looking hideous. So, twist. The ladies aren't really beautiful! They just look beautiful when they take pills.
The miners meet The Ladies, and other than Eve everyone's getting along pretty well. Eve doesn't really want to party with these guys, so the three miners start fighting over the other two ladies, and things break down. Eve bolts, and now the gang needs to track them down or else they can't get the dilithium and so on. Also, the planet's covered in dust!
Everyone goes looking for Eve for a while, then one of the miners just kind of stumbles upon her and they go back to his place where she is mighty unhappy to be with him. She shows him how pissed she is by cooking him breakfast (?) and he is angry about this (!). He tells her that a real man makes his own breakfast, and hotties are only for banging. Her good looks fade, and he's like "Well, what's the point?" Kirk and Our Man Mudd show up (I missssssed himmmm) and explain about the Hottie Pills, which are apparently illegal too? What is with space criminalizing everything, you guys? I can understand an ethical argument against taking a pill to make you conventionally attractive (probably this was an allegory about plastic surgery?) but making it illegal seems excessive, especially because it appears to have no negative effects. Kirk casually holds out a pill and she swallows it and gives the miner a hard "IS THIS WHAT YOU WANT???!!!" Then Kirk, that sly old dogg, explains: the pill was a placebo. You went back to being a hottie because you gained Self Confidence! Kirk gets the dilithium crystals, smirkingly discusses imprisoning Our Man Mudd, and Eve gets married to the coal miner, because now they're into each other.
I'm sorry, but this episode is space-insane. She gets more beautiful because she gains self-confidence? Does she learn a valuable lesson or something? Is this episode a fairy tale? Because of the Space Magical Realism of this episode, I'm inclined to think of it as non-canonical. A little folk tale, basically. Let's close out with a Kirk Smug Mug COUPLED with a OUR MAN MUDD SMUG MUG:

Two pieces of housekeeping:
I really hope that Mudd comes back. I probably don't mind about spoilers, if someone mentioned that he shows up again, but obviously I'd want the details to be a surprise. But he is one of my all-time favorite characters on the show so far, maybe tied with Fencing Sulu for second, after Uhura Always.
Also, it has come to my attention that some of my readers are genuine Star Trek fans (or "Starries," as they prefer to be called) and want to comment to correct my understanding of a story or to generally engage me about the show. Feel free! I'd love to know what you guys think of this silly ol' blog.

The Enemy Within: Season One Episode Five

I'll be honest from the start here: this is not my favorite all-time episode. I'm sorry, but you cannot keep me from Uhura this long. In fact, I'm going to have a comment on this subject later. Don't let me forget!
The situation is that some of the gang is on a planet, just looking at rocks, when jackass Fisher cuts his hand pretty bad and has to get beamed back and is covered in ore and whatever. More importantly, perhaps, is the fact that the gang finds a cute hilarious dog/unicorn hybrid, or a unicanine.
Scotty gives Fisher a once-over with his weird-substance-detector, and decides Fisher's cool, don't worry about it. You guys update your software please.
But we're missing the main point here, which is that the ore that Fisher's covered in causes Kirk to split into two dudes: Good Kirk and Evil Kirk (or "Krik," as I have just decided to call him). The primary distinction between the two is that Krik totally wears eyeliner (how is that evil Star Trek what are you trying to say just kidding you're cool) and also staggers around like a freaking troglodyte. He can totally talk, but does so very rarely, like Frankenstein in the original book, and in this example I am that asshole who read the book and is a dick about how Frankenstein's monster can talk.
Kirk goes to take a nap in his quarters, where Rand was just chilling while he was gone, because it's totally normal for yeomen to hang out in a captain's quarters when the captain's not around. Krik, on the other hand, immediately begins causing trouble because the dude does not know who his parents are, or something. He wanders over to McCoy's office and immediately acts like he's about to make out with McCoy because this is a slash fiction episode:

But no Krik just demands booze instead, which luckily the always-drunk McCoy keeps right next to the examination table. Krik begins to wander the halls sipping on bourbon like Ulysses S Grant, until he comes across Yeoman Rand's quarters. He totally TOUCHES a painting she has placed in her room, maybe she was even painting it herself, whatever, dick move, and decides to settle in.
Over in Kirk's quarters, Spock drops by to be like "Bro I heard you almost kissed McCoy and then grabbed his Southern Comfort. This is all plausibly Kirk behavior but certainly seems a bit X-treme. You cool?" Kirk has no idea what he's talking about, so the ever-loyal Spock decides that McCoy, the doctor, is going insane and they shouldn't stress over it. They almost decide to worry about this idea, when they get a call from Scotty, who has discovered a weird thing about the unicanine clone that popped out of the transporter: It is the exact opposite of the regular unicanine. Instead of saying, "Scotty, it is crazy to claim you can tell the difference of personalities between two alien pooches you just met, have you been stealing liquor from the doctor too?" they just say, "Oh, that's weird. Good thing it DEFINITELY DIDN'T HAPPEN TO KIRK." and also realize they can't beam back Sulu and the gang from the planet they were on, which sucks because the planet's getting crazy cold at night. Here's a pretty unnecessary picture of this scene, just because I love almost everything in this picture:

Seriously, Kirk is wearing his leisure shirt, and a worried Scotty is holding that kooky dog, which has definitely been sedated, because the personality differences between the dogs is that one is docile and one is barking like crazy. Sorry, I don't usually use this blog to make fun of Star Trek, but this episode was not my favorite so, sorry.
Next, we head over to Rand's room, where TENSION has been building. I want to comment quickly on the decor. She has a wall that, when you touch it, slides open to become a dresser/makeup table. Why not just have a dresser/makeup table there? The reason is that it was 1966, and as fucking genius Natasha Vargas-Cooper writes, this was an era of clean lines. This was the era that Stanley Kubrick defined the antiseptic future. WHOA. Sorry. On the story, which is awful. Krik tries to rape Rand. She calls out for help, and that JACKASS FISHER pushes the intercom button and wastes so much time identifying himself that he doesn't even get a chance to say "Krik is trying to rape Rand you guys" before Krik incapacitates him. Damn it Fisher, you're terrible at everything. I'm glad you got your hand cut. Krik returns to Kirk's room to hide and nurse his wounds.
Now comes the worst part of any workplace ever. Rand has reported to her direct superior (Spock, maybe?) that the ship's captain attempted to rape her. Spock responds to this officially filed accusation by having Kirk, himself, and McCoy yell at her until she agrees it wasn't Kirk, and that he must have a double running around the ship. As I mentioned earlier, the Enterprise has a serious protocol problem with sexual harassment, and this is definitely a nadir in Human Resources management. They leave Rand to deal with her ladyproblems on her own, and try to combine the two unicanines. They become one dead unicanine, so no luck, Kirk.
Also, Kirk is weakening and can't make any decisions and is markedly un-Kirk-like. He asks Spock to make a decision for him, and Spock gets furious at him and says a captain must appear perfect or the crew will hate him. Spock, stop working for the Kim Jong-Il administration. Meanwhile, Sulu is getting colder! He claims it's 10 below, which maybe they don't use the same measurements in the future that we do now, because 10 below could kill you (I think?).
Kirk and Spock have an idea of where Krik might be, so they go searching for him in the coolest room ever:

Just to drive this point home: Significant portions of the crew are slowly freezing to death, the transporter's busted, AND an evil guy who looks like the captain is wandering around attempting sexual assault. Clearly you need the captain and the first mate on guessing-where-the-bad-guy-is-and-tryin'-to-catch-him duty. You know where Uhura almost certainly was for this? Doing. Her. Job. Checking on communictions, translating things from Romulan, and decoding incoming transmissions. STOP PLAYING ADVENTURE-SPIES, KIRK AND SPOCK. Get security to look for Krik.
Anyway, after that some stuff happens and things move pretty slow. Krik and Kirk end up on the bridge, and they have a "which one of us is the real Kirk???" moment, but nobody has to choose because the Krik tries to beat people up and they get him to get back into the tranporter, which is fixed now so don't worry Sulu.
My significant other, who is super Jewish, suggests that this is a very Jewish episode. According the Judaism, every person has the Good Inclination and the Evil Inclination in them. And you need both. The Good Inclination helps you, you know, not be a jerk, and the Evil Inclination helps you get things done. Krik is evil, but proactive. Kirk is basically good, but super wishy-washy. When we combine the two, we get the decisive, powerful Kirk we all need. That's a pretty cool analysis. But beyond it, this episode wasn't thrilling. Oh, and the editing was great. Considering it was 1966, they did a great job of showing Kirk and Krik in the same scenes. They used the Stop Trick, invented by Georges Méliès in - wait for this - 1896! So I guess it had been 70 years, which is not incredible, but it's well-executed here. Not Ernie Kovacs-well, but it was good. Sorry for all of these qualifiers. Fuck, whatever, here's the Smug Mug:

The Naked Time: Season One Episode Four

So far this is my favorite episode of Star Trek ever, and probably the best episode of any TV series in history. This episode has it all, you guys, and more. That's why Star Trek was immediately canceled following the airing of this episode; they knew they could never top this (I have no idea yet if they top this. I'm very excited to find out).
The episode begins in the pre-naked time, or "Stardate: The Clothed Time." Spock and a jackass named Joe are asked to land on a planet where some people recently died, wander around, check out the sights, and watch the planet crumble. This seems like a pretty cool mission, and ideally every mission for the whole series. "Okay, next you have a planet thirty light years away that's gonna die. Go watch that."
Spock is the very model of competence, AS PER USUAL, but Joe is so stupid that he removes his glove so he can wipe his nose (!) and forgets to put it back on before he goes and touches everything. Looks like Joe might get sick, no surprises and really good riddance. You need to thin the herd, Enterprise, if you've been hiring morons like this:
They get back on the ship, and Spock has no idea what killed the people, but a quick checkup on him and Joe reveals that both are pretty healthy (OR ARE THEY?). McCoy uses the opportunity to make fun of Spock for the way his body works (come on, you're a doctor, cut it out), but it's probably just jealous over Spock's hot bod in a t-shirt (this episode includes a lot of hot bods, spoiler alert).
A little while later, Joe is having lunch in the recreation room, where people are playing awesome outer space games, which is swiftly in my top five Things To See on Star Trek. Sulu walks in with his boyfriend, Kevin Riley, having a discussion over whether or not fencing is awesome (Sulu is pro-fencing, obvi). Joe is feeling weird, and flips his shit when Sulu talks to him and SO BEGINS THE NAKED TIME. Joe foolishly challenges Sulu to a knife-fight, but Sulu was just talking about how awesome fencing is so who do you think ends up stabbed?
Later, the gang is watching the planet fall apart, which as you may remember was their mission, and they realize it's falling apart wayyyy faster than expected, and maybe it's taking them with it? Everyone gets pretty bored, especially Sulu, who is coming down with NAKED TIME'S DISEASE, as indicated by being covered in sweat. He leans over to Kevin, and invites him to go hang out at the gym (it's not clear if Sulu is out on the Enterprise, but it is clear that he is out to the audience). He insists they do some fencing, but Kevin wants to stay at his post, because Naked Time's Disease hasn't taken hold on him yet. So Sulu peaces out. (Worth noting, briefly: in this scene, and basically throughoutt the episode, Kirk is a total jerk to everybody and yells at them about how to do their jobs while doing basically nothing on his own. It's annoying. Example: McCoy says "I don't know what happened to Joe. I did all the possible medical tests on him." Kirk goes "TRY THE IMPOSSIBLE" which is absolutely not helpful, Kirk.)
Once he realizes that nobody cares that Sulu's gone, Kevin starts yelling at Spock and talking like an Irish cowboy and leaves. This. Is. Awesome. It made me want a spinoff that takes place on an Old West planet where Kevin (who starts calling himself O'Riley, btw) has to be the new sheriff but maybe nobody respects him because prejudice against Irish? I don't know, I'm just the idea man. But look at this:

Riley checks in at sick bay, where he infects the nurse with Naked Time's Disease, whose character name is ACTUALLY "Christine Chapel," and who is played by Gene Roddenberry's then-girlfriend, later wife. But nobody cares, because the greatest thing in history occurs right after this:
Yes, Sulu has taken off his shirt, and he. is. ripped. He is brandishing a fencing-sword (rapier?) and looking for trouble. He straight up tries to duel everyone he meets, and is generally causing problems and is wonderful. True story: the original draft of this episode had him turning into a samurai, but George Takei was like "No racism pls" so they said "How about a musketeer?" and MAGIC HAPPENED.
Meanwhile, back on the bridge, in the absence of Sulu and Kevin, Uhura has been asked to do their job as well as her own, yet another reminder of her overwhelming competence and another chance to wonder why she doesn't demand a promotion or something. Go get it, girl.
She stands up for like two minutes and is taken captive by Musketeer Sulu (quit this job, Uhura). Sulu is felled in like two seconds by Spock. The ship is close to getting eaten up by the falling-apart planet, but they can't do anything because Keltic Kowboy Kevin has taken over the ship from another room, and is singing Irish ballads over the PA (stay a while, Uhura, this job is ridiculous) and demanding that women wear their hair down (Kirk: "Turn off the PA, Uhura." Uhura: "I can't. He's locked it." Kirk: "TRY HARDER."). Keltic Kowboy Kevin's holing up in this control room is another opportunity for a crewmember (in this case, Scotty) to try to do his job, and for Kirk to YELL at him to just forget safety protocols and shoot lasers directly at the wall as hard as he can. Who will take the fall if this backfires, Kirk? You?
Then comes another awesome setpiece. Nurse Chapel and Spock, who both have Naked Time's Disease, share a moment of wanting to make out, Chapel especially basically ripping off her clothes right there, but Spock is all, "I am a Vulcan. I don't wanna do it." Then leaves the room and starts crying. It is awesome, and amazing, and supposedly increased Leonard Nimoy's fan mail to the max.
Kirk sees Spock crying, and decides an appropriate response is FRIENDSHIP SLAPS. Unfortunately, Naked Time's Disease is passed by violent contact, so when Spock slaps Kirk back, he gives it to Kirk, and Kirk realizes he might be in love with Rand (?!). Luckily, McCoy has the cure to Naked Time's Disease, but whoops has to rip Kirk's shirt to dose him. Brief emotional outbursts aside, everyone gets back on track and solves their problem of the planet trying to destroy them, but for some reason they travel three days back in time, which is completely awesome. Everyone's like What Does This Mean, and Kirk's like, "I guess we're gonna find out," and then they all ZOOM off into space, and you in the audience are so excited you can not stand it.
This episode was directed by Marc Daniels, an extremely prolific TV director of the time, who directed a ton of I Love Lucy, and did the scene where Spock has an emotional breakdown so well you guys. And what post would be complete without one of these:

Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan

Last night's screening included a Q&A with Nicholas Meyer, director of Wrath of Khan. So that was pretty cool. He's a smart, funny, and insightful guy who is also tremendously full of himself, so it was fun to hear him talk about how he hasn't seen any blockbusters lately that pay any attention to the story. You know how it goes with the old timers. But let's jump into the movie, right?

So we're in the Enterprise, and things are not going great for Captain Saavik. She appears to be in a no-win situation with Problems. But turns out it was just a test, for Kirk's reality show Starfleet's Next Top Captain. It was a lose-lose scenario, he explains to Saavik, but he was the only dude who never lost, because of course he was. Anyway, things are little bit not-thrilling, mostly because Uhura has STILL not been promoted, despite working nearly two decades at this entry-level job. What the hell Starfleet.
Also, in the time between this movie and the last, Kirk has finally realized that he is getting pretty damn old. Apparently he is way into antiques, which I guess is a being-old thing. Also, and possibly more significantly, it's suggested that McCoy has been keeping Kirk high 24/7 as a favor. It's Kirk's birthday, so OF COURSE McCoy shows up with some mad old Romulan ale. The bros kick back and toast to aging and not having to battle old enemies.
Meanwhile, Chekov has been promoted like crazy, and is now right-hand man to the Captain of a different ship, tasked with building planets for some reason. They head on down to a desert planet, just to check stuff out, and get cold AMBUSHED by the most fearsome dude we ever knew, Shere Khan. Shere Khan was left with his crew on this planet by Kirk (just bein' Kirk), and is now hungry for revenge. Played by Ricardo Montalban, he is just 100% of awesome in every way, and also totally ripped. Like, seriously, he is incredibly buff you guys.
Shere Khan explains that lots of his team, including his wife, were killed by having Yeerks climb into their ears - this first makes people susceptible to suggestion, then crazy, then dead. He drops them in Chekov and his captain's ears, then rolls the dice.
Hanging out on the Enterprise just to party, Kirk gets a call from the team designing the planet-building stuff, seeming upset, so guess what Kirk's in charge again and off we go!
Basically it was a trap, and Khan is there to go crazy attacking Kirk. This is when things get super fun, because Khan's crew keeps reminding him of how awesome they have it. They have a boss ship, a device that builds planets - nothing's stopping them from just making a planet for themselves that is beautiful and lush and then just living out their days comfortably. But guess what Shere Khan has more important plans - killing Kirk.
Kirk outmaneuvers Shere Khan by using cheat codes, and they hang out with the last remaining scientists with their planet-making device. One of them - surprise - banged Kirk back in the day, and PS she has a son with Kirk's hairstyle (but growing on his head, not purchased). Also, the scientists have created this awesome beautiful underground ecosystem, sort of to test their planet-making thing, sort of for fun. Everyone chills out there until it's time to return to the Enterprise and get Chekov in bed so he can recover (they got the Yeerk out, PS).
They go up against Shere Khan again, and kill every single crew member of his except the man himself. The Enterprise is damaged super-bad in the fight, and they realize that Shere Khan's hatred for Kirk is so strong he's going to build a planet around himself and Kirk just to kill them both. The Enterprise's warp drive is completely messed up, and the warp room is leaking radiation like crazy. So Spock decides he's gotta sacrifice himself to save everybody, which works but it sucks because his BFF Kirk has to watch him die. They escape just in the nick of time, as Shere Khan makes a new planet out of pure hatred.
This movie was so good, you guys. I completely get what everyone talks about when they say this movie was great, and it actually got me excited for the next one, which I didn't expect. The tragedy, of course, is no more Shere Khan (until I get to his episode on TOS).

Star Trek: The Motion Picture

Last night I saw a midnight screening of Star Trek: The Motion Picture, with a pre-movie Q&A with Arlene Martel! It was really cool, and reminded me of this blog, and so here I am.

Obviously I'm not caught up with the series right now, but I don't think too much from the movie went over my head.
In a couple of prologues, we see this enormous freaking cloud shooting lasers at spaceships for no reason, just destroying this gaggle of Klingons who were basically just chilling out. I have to confess, that this cloud is 100% of terrifying. The movie's special effects are much cooler than the show's, and director Robert Wise chose to spend about ten minutes out of every half hour slowly panning across the Laser Cloud. This made some critics say that the movie lacked plot. I say it made the whole thing even scarier. Seriously. Just these quiet, slow pans across a kloud that kills.

When we last saw our heroes (apparently) they were doing their thing on the USS Enterprise. You know, NBD. But since then, some things have changed. Well, not a lot of things. Uhura, Sulu, Chekov, and (!) Rand are still toiling away in their dead-end jobs, some with mild promotions. Spock, on the other hand, has been away at camp on Vulcan, training to be more of a stone-cold harsh dude, and making lanyards. Kirk has been inexplicably promoted to Admiral, and Bones has been getting wasted, growing a boss beard, and banging everyone he encounters, using his Sex Medallion as a seduction tool. Scotty has been growing a mustache, but I don't recall where.
The Enterprise, in the power vacuum created by Kirk's promotion, is being commanded by Capt. Decker, a minister from a small town in Ohio who has like a dozen kids. As soon as Kirk hears about the Insane Cloud Posse, he gets back onto the Enterprise, demotes Decker for like no reason, and Reclaims His Throne.

Then quite a bit of nothing happens for a while. Basically, the Enterprise just flies toward the cloud for a while, and then reaches the cloud. They hire Sinead O'Connor to help out, and the very second she meets Kirk she tells him she has a vow of celibacy. Which, okay, do what you gotta do, but apparently Kirk's reputation is pretty set among Starfleeters. Even though he's her direct superior. So, she could just refer him to her H.R. rep if he tried anything. But she goes the celibacy route. So, okay.
Also, turns out she has a history with Decker, and the two of them share Meaningful Glances for basically the length of the movie.
They get to the cloud, and my least favorite thing in the movie happens. Spock uses his computer to figure out that the cloud communicates in a higher frequency or whatever than the Enterprise does, which is why it hasn't responded positively to their "What Up" messages. Here's what sucks about this: Uhura already gets basically nothing to do here. Let her be good at her job, please. She can figure this stuff out.
Anyway, they start chatting with the cloud, and then it attacks them, and then it eats Sinead O'Connor, and then it sends her back with a creepy voice. The cloud is named V'ger (pronounced "vagina") and it is sad and confused, like 24/7.
They keep flying deeper and deeper into the cloud, which is equal parts tedious and terrifying.
Once things are crazy dangerous enough, they get to the heart of the thing, and Kirk decides it's time to go exploring. He is led by Sinead, because she's acting as an operative for V'ger. He takes Spock, because Spock mind-melded with the thing or something. Decker wants to come, so fine. And he takes McCoy, because BROS FOR LIFE.
They get in close and figure out that oh man V'ger is short for "Voyager 6" and it has just collected all the information in the universe and wants to give it back to earth, in the form of DESTRUCTION. Obviously there's only one solution: Decker has to meld with V'ger and also with Sinead O'Connor, and then it's okay. It's like they're getting married basically.
Their job done (a ton of Starfleeters dead), Kirk and The Jets return to The Enterprise. Kirk figures Decker and Sinead might not count as dead, so he puts them down as "missing," WHICH WILL FUCK WITH THEIR FAMILIES' PENSIONS AND BENEFITS KIRK COME ON, and decides to just keep captaining this spaceship, and flying off to "that-a-way." Until next time!

Where No Man Has Gone Before: Season One Episode Three

This episode has the absolute worst title of all THREE episodes I have seen before, because it has like nothing to do with the episode. I recommend, as a new title: Gary Mitchell And The Trouble With Psychics. Or whatever.
Let's also get something out of the way really early: this episode featured no Uhura whatsoever, so I consider it automatically in a fourth tier of episodes:
Tier One: Episodes about Uhura or written by Nichelle Nichols (0 so far)
Tier Two: Episodes featuring Uhura (2 so far)
Tier Three: Episodes where Uhura doesn't appear but is discussed at length (0 so far)
Tier Four: Episodes with no Uhura (1 so far)
This episode also completely ignored Yeoman Janice Rand, which meant that somebody else needed to spend the whole episode being sexually harassed. Luckily, along came Sally Kellerman, playing an obvious descendant of her character in MASH, a doctor who is just trying to do her job (medicine) but cannot get taken seriously by the raging chauvinists around her.
Chief among these chauvinists is the titular character (in my improved title), Gary Mitchell. He and Kirk have been BFFs for a while (apparently since Gary was Kirk's student at Academy -- I knew a kid like that in high school; it was weird), and Kirk pulled some strings to get this guy assigned to The Enterprise. Unfortunately, the Enterprise decides to fly into a spaceforcefield for stupid reasons I didn't quite understand because Uhura was not around to explain them, and the spaceforcefield ZAPS Gary Mitchell pretty bad. It also ZAPS Sally Kellerman, but not as bad, so we can ignore it for now (at our own peril).
When we catch up with Gary, he has pseyes (Tyra Banks' trademark Psychic Eyes), but people are pretending it's not a big deal. He is also becoming a total dick, which is obviously a bigger deal, especially as far as Kirk is concerned. As we learned in Charlie Sex, Kirk does NOT abide dicks on his ship. Right before we see Gary turning dickish, though, Spock needs to take some time out of his day to yell at Sally Kellerman for refusing to believe in a version of ESP other than "the normal kind." Kirk's argument: "Do you know for sure there ISN'T another kind?" This seems rational enough for Spock, and so should it for us all.
Oh -- according to the internet, the pseyes were created by wedging tin foil in between two contact lenses, which was a terrible system even by the 60's standards, and hurt the actor playing Gary Mitchell pretty bad and were genuinely dangerous. So, um, there's that. This does not excuse Gary trying to hypnotize Sally Kellerman into banging him, though, or his way of just being obnoxious all the time to everybody.
Anyway, you know where this is going. He gets more and more psychic, Kirk has to make a hard choice, Sally Kellerman gets pseyes eventually and saves the day (with Kirk's help, mostly). The Big Showdown comes on an abandoned distillery planet or something, which is photographed beautifully:
This episode's Director of Photography was Ernest Haller, who was also DP for Gone with the Wind, which is pretty badass.
Let's end this post with a few important Kirk moments. First, here's Kirk toward the end of the Final Showdown:
If you know of anything sexier than this, GOOD LUCK GETTING A SCREENCAP OF IT.
Next, the episode begins with Kirk AGAIN beating Spock at spacechess by being wildly unpredictable! That's how chess works you guys. This of course leads to the Kirk Smug Mug of the Episode:

Charlie X: Season One Episode Two

Let's get this out of the way immediately: I will be referring to the title character of this episode as "Charlie Sex" for the duration of this post. Okay? Okay.
So this episode deals with the problems that come with having a teenager around. Some people from a tiny space ship called Antares (fun fact: until reading the wikipedia article on this episode, I thought that the Antaris were an alien race or something) drop off a surly teenager with the Enterprise, apparently for summer camp or something. Now, Kirk should have been pretty suspicious basically immediately, because the Antarniks are all like "It's good that you did that, Charlie," and the Enterprise has what Kirk describes as "entertainment tapes." But whatever, they decide they can totally take care of a teenager, no problem. Haha suckers. No one can handle a teenager under normal circumstances.
It turns out Charlie can totally control things with his mind, and is also just way pissy. This would be cool, but he develops a huge crush on Yeoman Rand, who's apparently the first woman he's ever seen up close, and whose sexual attractiveness is directly proportional to the height of her hair.
Things get out of hand, though, when Charlie Sex catches a dude patting another dude on the behind, leading him to think that this is appropriate behavior in general, and leading him to try that move on J-Rand.
Here's where the episode gets awesome, from a Women's Studies perspective. Rand needs to deal with this sexual harassment fast, before it gets way out of control. Unfortunately the Enterprise has no HR rep, and no women in leadership positions at all for the most part, so Rand has to ask Charlie to talk to Kirk about why what he did is inappropriate. In terms of issues women face in the workplace, this is kind of a doozy. Kirk will not adequately express to Charlie why this kind of sexual harassment is not okay. In fact, look at him trying to figure out why it would be:
"Now why would a woman not want her body patted and grabbed? Wait... maybe... if the man involved weren't me... no, I lost it. I dunno."
Charlie continues harassing Rand, even after Rand tries to set him up with her flat-haired friend. Rand sees the warning signs of dangerous stalking and possible sexual assault, and tells Kirk flat-out that she knows what direction this is going. Kirk seems to take her seriously, but responds by again giving Charlie a bro-chat, this time while wrestling shirtless, which is kind of the only way Kirk can be comfortable with bro-chats. Again, despite Spock and McCoy's insistence that Charlie Sex looks up to Kirk like a father, his words go unheeded by his new ward. Charlie Sex starts Disappearing people with an efficacy that could make Stalin weep (too soon?).
Anyway, they have to confuse him when he takes control of the ship and whatever and finally return him to his dad who's a TOTAL DICK who does NOT UNDERSTAND Charlie and also is made of smoke or something. Whatever. Problem solved. Gender issued endemic on the ship not solved. But honestly, like the best episodes of Mad Men (and actually much like The Office's Boys and Girls), this episode highlights the challenges women face in these male-dominated fields and the need for female advocacy. But none of that is as important as my favorite part of this episode:
I have held off on mentioning her, but is there any character more awesome than Uhura, basically always? First of all, in the "Uhura's job sucks" file, her whole switchboard gets electrocuted by Charlie Sex, zapping her pretty bad, and she just tries to shake it off while Kirk actually lifts her up and forces her back in her chair to continue working. Yikes.
But this episode gives us another glimpse of Uhura's rich inner life by taking us to The Best Place In Space, The Enterprise's break room:
First of all, I love that Spock is that asshole that sits down with his guitar (or Vulcan space-guitar) and insists that everyone shut up and listen to him playing, like no one has anything better to do. One example of other fun activities include: Uhura is just watching Rand play solitaire, because apparently Rand does not share. Uhura, thwarted again. UNTIL: She starts singing. She improvises songs about people who are around, although wikipedia suggests they are based on old Scottish folk songs, which is kind of extra awesome. I really wish the two of them would take their act on the road, with her whole "Hey Spock how long 'til Pon-Farr?" and his whole "Doin it is way illogical lady I'm just here for the music" routine. It's really adorable, and I want more Uhura. I demand it.
Kirk moments from this episode include the fact that his chest is shaved for the only time in the series on this episode, which leads me to believe that morning Kirk was staring himself down in the mirror (like every morning) and finally said "I wonder?" Also, Kirk beats Spock at space-chess because he's SO ILLOGICAL Spock can't defend against his moves. I'll close this post with the Kirk Smug Mug of the Episode: