ALL SCI-FI

[Bud Brewster]

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Good old Star Trek. It’s “feast or famine” from week to week. One episode will be terrific, like the one Bog reviews below — and the another episode will have hot space babes in miniskirts and boots, ruling very hairy barbarians and swiping important body parts from Mr. Spock.

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The Tholian Web - episode #64

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_________________________ Tholian Ship


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The Enterprise and crew enter a region of space where space itself phases in and out. This involves some kind of dimensional warping, one of the more wilder science fiction concepts which moves a story beyond simply space travel.

Another starship, the Defiant, and her crew have already fallen victim to this dimensional/spatial malady. The other ship fluctuates in and out of view. Kirk beams over to the shifting Defiant with Spock, McCoy and Chekov.

We get to see the crew wear funky spacesuits in this one; their fear in this one is ending up in a vacuum.

In an eerie sequence of scenes, we see that the Defiant's crew appears to have killed each other. This shifting dimensional space also affects the brains of humans, causing a degeneration into insanity. These and later scenes recall the bouts of insanity in Is There in Truth no Beauty? earlier this same season.



Unfortunately, Kirk should have left Chekov on the Enterprise; Scotty is able to beam back only 3 of them at a time and the Defiant fades away before they can get Kirk back — he's gone, as in — all the way gone (there's something about the number 3 on this show, I declare). Spock and the rest have to assume eventually that Kirk is lost in the line of duty. They even hold a funeral service for Kirk later - it's not the most quiet service; yes, this is Kirk's final episode . . . just kidding. But, before that, the Tholians show up. They're territorial and want the Enterprise outta there!




As with quite a few of the episodes in the 3rd season, this is saddled with a snail pace in spots, but the alien Tholians almost compensate for this rather dreary tone. While we were still seeing actors dressed up with lame appliances on their heads & faces 20 and 25 years later on the later series (TNG, DS9, etc.) as a display of alien representatives, here we see a truly innovative attempt at visualizing an alien race, complete with an unusual audio signature. You won't soon forget the Tholians, including their leader, Loskene (a great name, as well).

_____________________________ Loskeen


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Their energy web — well, that's another matter. While this looks cool at first glance, it seems to me that this tactic would work only if an enemy vessel sat unmoving for an hour or two, not using its weaponry. How often does that happen? The web strategy, like many scenes in this episode, has a draggy somnambulant tonality, though one may get hypnotized by the patterns developed.



This episode is also unusual in that Kirk shows up only in the pre-credits scenes and the first act, then he disappears until the last 5 minutes of the episode (not counting his appearances as a ghost). Hence, we observe a new group dynamic shifting into place to fill in the gap.

Spock & McCoy further their tense relationship, while Scotty moves in to complete a new trinity. There's an interesting scene with the trio in Spock's quarters near the end, just before final maneuvers are to be made, and Scotty walks off with obvious plans to get drunk.

I found some of the interaction between Spock & McCoy to be a bit too extreme, as if McCoy had gone a little over the deep end with Kirk's presumed death. He makes some accusatory statements towards Spock which were out of character. However, everyone was going a little crazy in this region of space, especially Chekov. (Boy, that guy can really scream, can't he?)



In all, another venture into the possible dangers of deep space exploration, some of which we may not expect.

Extra Trek Trivia: This episode won an Emmy for special FX; artist Mike Minor contributed to the episode.

There was a kind of sequel to this episode in the final season of the Enterprise series, in the episode In a Mirror,Darkly, where it was shown that the Defiant had re-appeared 100 years earlier in the parallel universe first seen in Mirror, Mirror.

BoG's Score: 7 out of 10




BoG
Galaxy Overlord Galactus
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)