Captain's Blog pt. 46: Plato's Stepchildren

I knew from the start of this project that I'd end things with a TOS top 50. (In my head, I hear a radio ad campaign: It ends where it all began... narrated by Morgan Freeman.) But I wasn't sure how I was going to approach it. I knew I didn't want to do an episode-by-episode re-watch, nor just transmit production details nor anecdotes. All of that stuff is great fun, but it's well-covered terrain.

Does anyone really need another reiteration of why "Turnabout Intruder" is so awesome stupid?

And while I liked the idea of a "Top 50," I didn't really want to approach it like a countdown. And I certainly didn't want to spend time summarizing any plots. I listen to the Mission Log podcast and read all the re-watches out there, and it amazes me how much time is spent recapping the episodes. Surely if you're listening to a Trek podcast or reading a re-watch online, you know that info already? Or know how to look up Memory-Alpha or any of the thousand other sites that exhaustively detail each episode?

At the same time, what was I going to do, just some random smattering of episodes, with no production detail? That struck me as an unfulfilling end to the Captain's Blog project. So, I compromised. I decided to rank every episode (and if you stay after class, I'll show you the spreadsheet; it's a work of art. You can sort the data by "Does Chekov Scream?" "Kirk Insanity," "60s-ness" and many other fun columns) but instead of presenting it in countdown format, I'm just going to riff on whatever episode of the 50 I whittled down as best/ personal favorites I want to riff about that day.

And to keep it fun for myself, I'll award points the way Clive Anderson did in the original Whose Line Is It Anyway? Slightly more scientific, but not very.

Have you guys ever played around with TV Tango? I love thinking about what was on when this stuff aired for the first time. Gives it all a whole different context. "Plato's Stepchildren aired on November 22, 1968, against Judd for the Defense on ABC.

Let me walk you through what you can expect going forward via an episode that is not in my own Desert Island Top 50, "Plato's Stepchildren."

SCRIPT / THEME: Because sometimes a script is terrible, but the idea or theme is kind of cool. Actually this happens often. Take "Plato's Stepchildren." It has some good lines and ideas, but the execution is ridiculous; the pacing is off, the set-up is flawed, inconsistent characterization (a hallmark of Season 3 episodes) and the arcs/ acts are problematic. And it undermines the niftiness of the theme, i.e. these aliens escaped their planet when it was destroyed - I'm sorry, when it "nova-ed," as Parmen says. I really want to see a planet go nova - went to Earth and lived as humans in the time of Plato, then took off again for the stars and settled on a planet where a rare and unique element -

which, naturally, McCoy can replicate from random stuff in his medkit -

turns them all into telekinetic blobs of lazy sadists. Except for Alexander, of course, the little person whom Kirk treats kindly and sticks up for.

I mean, this is a wacky assemblage of ideas. But it's kind of awesome, too, and I'd wager a big part of why TOS has such long-standing appeal is for stuff like this (or "The Savage Curtain") as much as it is for any of its more celebrated moments. It's almost a given for TOS that at some point someone will say "Yeah I know (this one or that one) sucks, but it's a personal fave/ guilty pleasure." POINTS AWARDED (out of a possible 10:) - 10 / + 5

SHATNER: If you only watch the show as a delivery mechanism for the blitzkrieg of insanity from William Shatner, then none of the above (or below) matters, of course.

And nor should it.

Unlike most other shows, entire episodes can become classics simply because they contain four or five seconds of Shatner-craziness, hence his having his own category.

POINTS AWARDED (out of a possible 10:): 10. To give you an idea, this category always yields at least 1 point, as Shatner gets a point just by showing up. Whereas "I am Kirok" gets at least 50.

VISUAL DESIGN: This is an umbrella category for fx, set, costumes, and lighting, all things TOS really excelled at for its time. Me-TV here in Chicago plays this as part of a Sci-Fi Saturday, and this really sticks out in-between Lost in Space and Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea. Sure some of the fx are dated, but that gives everything a unique flavor, as well. This is undermined by the digital re-imagining of the series.

(Expect a lot of crankiness on the digitized episodes over the next 50-ish posts.)

"Plato's Stepchildren" is a good example of the sets/ costumes seeming to be surplus from the studio store or other productions. Not uncommon for TV in general but specific to TOS Season 3, it was mandated that every third episode had to use pre-existing sets and costumes.

At the same time, I'm happy to reward points for an episode that exploits its paucity of set design to great effect, such as "Spectre of the Gun." But for "Plato's," it's nothing special. (And in the case of some of the telekinetic fx, you can see the strings in a lot of shots.) POINTS AWARDED (out of a possible 3): 1.5

TITLE: Moreso than most shows, TOS had some wacky titles.

Sometimes they encourage you to read the episode through a much different lens. That's the case here. I'm not a Plato expert, nor does one need to be to understand the story. But it's an interesting frame for this story and nudges you to consider the actions of the characters along Platonic lines. The script keeps insisting the Platonians represent a corruption of Ancient Greek ideals, and that's certainly arguable. But does making them "step-children" suggest something else? Frankly, the script is messy enough where I don't feel the need to delve much deeper, but perhaps the episode is meant as a metaphor for the debate between between Platonic and Aristotelian theorists. (Or maybe it's named that only to make me wonder that.) POINTS AWARDED (out of a possible 3): 2.

INTERNAL LOGIC/ CONSISTENCY: I'll be pretty forgiving in this category, as all the Trek continuity we've been examining over the past 45 blogs was still forming over the 3 seasons of TOS. That's important to keep in mind; what we examine here was in no way assured of its immortality. For all these guys knew, they were making something as lost to TV oblivion as the aforementioned Judd for the Defense. Still, there are times where an idea is not well thought out, is inaccurately presented, or contradicts itself. In "Plato's Stepchildren," it's mainly the telekinesis.

I mean, making people walk funny is one thing...

but how exactly do the Platonians make people laugh and cry and speak in verse? This is a use of telekinesis that stretches the concept beyond plausibility. Or at least makes you ask why if they can control stuff like that, why can't they just heal themselves? If they can reach into your body and make your organs do stuff/ provoke chemical reactions, it stands to reason they could pummel bacteria to smithereens.

I was going to continue in this fashion, then I caught myself wondering too much about it / ready to go down an internet rabbit hole looking up corroborating info and smacked myself, Captain Kirk style. I'm just not going to get into a serious biological/ chemical reaction discussion via "Plato's Stepchildren."

POINTS AWARDED (out of a possible 5): - 10. (Additionally, the Platonians display a knowledge of Earth-isms like Pièce de résistance or the Mexican hat dance that seems well beyond them, not being telepaths or having any access to the Enterprise computer.)

GUEST: Almost every TOS episode features a substantial guest part. I guess most TV does, sure, but a strong performance or characterization for the Featured Guest (or Guests) of TOS has a definite impact on how I process the episode. This episode features three strong characters/ memorable performances:

Michael Dunn as Alexander. He had an interesting life; check out his wiki.

Barbara Babcock as Philana

She also appears in "A Taste of Armageddon" and was later recruited as one of Sam's handlers on Cheers:

As recounted here.

And Roger Sterling plays Parmen, the Platonian leader. *

POINTS AWARDED (out of a possible 5): 3.5.

MEMORABILITY: "Plato's Stepchildren" is an interesting example of this category. In general, I'm going to not take points away for this, only add, with the criteria being simply "Is this one that has had a lasting impression?" i.e. get ten people in a room and Trekkie or not, there are certain images, catchphrases, even sounds/ approaches that people recognize, regardless of whether they know what episode it comes from. (This was demonstrated pretty well in The Cable Guy. I watched that with some non-Trekkie friends, and all of them recognized the music/ lirpas as associated with Trek - I know, it says it in the dialogue, but we were all talking over it, so that's not where they knew it from. I asked.)

But "Plato's Stepchildren" is one of the most well-known episodes in television history, as it features the first interracial (a term I really can't stand) kiss.  But Nichelle Nichols and William Shatner don't actually kiss.

Not actually kissing. They even had people on the set who were watching to make sure.

It was shot two ways, one with lip contact, one without. The one without contact was what aired, thus saving America from a collective mental breakdown/ eternity in Hell. But the one with contact is the one people seem to think happened. So I guess what we have here is the historic first simulated kiss between two fictional characters from the same planet who happen to have different skin colors on a show regularly involving aliens of all colors.

Nichelle Nichols: "They went so far as to suggest changing the scene so that Kirk gets paired off with Nurse Chapel and Spock ends up with me. Somehow, I guess, they found it more acceptable for a Vulcan to kiss me, for this alien to kiss a black woman, than for 2 humans with different coloring to do the same thing. It was absolutely ridiculous. Strange how a 23rd century space opera could be so mired in antiquated hang-ups."

Indeed.

POINTS AWARDED (out of a possible 5): 5, I guess, but a qualified 5, as it's memorable for so many wrong reasons. Still, it's a legitimate part of television history.

TOTAL POINTS AWARDED:  7

And there you have it, folks. I won't drown you in every last bit of my criteria, but this will be the general set-up for each of the episodes that follows. And when we get to the end of it all, we'll have a de facto 50 Memorable Episodes. (Well, 50-ish; I actually screencapped a couple extra.)

* Okay, not really.

Captain's Blog pt. 45: The Original Series

David Gerrold's The World of Star Trek is arguably the greatest written analysis of the Trek phenomenon, all the more remarkable in that it was published when only The Original Series and The Animated Series and a handful of non-canon books existed. (And when its author was in his early 20s!) It's tough to parse for quotes, since so much of it is spot-on and worthwhile, but for our purposes here (i.e. launching this conclusion of the Captain Blog's series, focused exclusively on TOS) I'll only focus on his comments re: format, formula, and "Green Priestesses of the Cosmic Computer."

"FORMAT is the flight plan for a series (...) and just like any other flight plan, the slightest error will magnify itself over a period of time if it isn't corrected or compensated for (...) Something that seems quite workable in the first 2 or 3 stories may turn out to be a very rigorous trap by the 13th or 14th iteration."

"The FORMULA story is the pat story, the easy story, the one that gets written by the book. It's a compilation of all the tried and true tricks. It's six devices in search of a plot. In Star Trek it might work something like this:

"The Enterprise approaches a planet (...) Kirk, Spock, and McCoy get captured by 6-ft green women in steel brassieres."

"They take away the spacemen's communicators because they offend the computer-god these women worship."

"Meanwhile, Scotty discovers that he's having trouble with the doubletalk generator, and he can't fix it. The Enterprise will shrivel into a prune in 2 hours unless something is done immediately. But Scotty can't get in touch with the Captain."

"Of course he can't. Kirk, Spock, and McCoy have been brought before the high priest of the cosmic computer, who decides that they are unfit to live. All except the Vulcan, who has such interesting ears. She puts Spock in a mind-zapping machine which leaves him quoting 17-syllable Japanese haiku for the next 2 acts. 

"McCoy can't do a damn thing for him. "I'm a doctor, not a critic!" he grumbles. Kirk seduces the cute priestess."

"On the ship, sparks fly from Chekov's control panel, and everyone falls out of their chairs. Uhura tries opening the hailing frequencies, and when she can't, she admits to being frightened... Scotty figures there's only 15 minutes left. Already the crew members are wrinkling as the starship begins to prune."

"Down on the planet, Kirk, Spock, and McCoy are being held in a dungeon."

"Why is it always a dungeon?"

"The girl Kirk's seduced decides that she has never had it so good in her life and discards all of her years-long training and lifetime-held beliefs to rescue him, conveniently remembering to bring him his communicator and phaser. Abruptly, Spock reveals how hard he has been working to hide his emotions and then snaps back to normal. Thinking logically, he and Kirk then drive the computer crazy with illogic."

"Naturally, it can't cope, its designers not having been as smart as our Earthmen. (...) It shorts out all its fuses and releases the Enterprise just in time for the last commercial. For a tag, the seduced priestess promises Kirk that she will work to build a new civilization on her planet - just for Kirk - one where steel brassieres are illegal."

"GREEN PRIESTESSES OF THE COSMIC COMPUTER has no internal conflict; it's all formula. Kirk doesn't have a decision to make (...) It's a compendium of all the bad plot devices that wore out their welcome on too many Star Trek episodes. It's all excitement, very little story. (...) FORMULA occurs when FORMAT starts to repeat itself. Or when writers are giving less than their best. (...) Flashy devices can conceal the lack for awhile, but ultimately, the lack of any real meat in the story will leave the viewers hungry and unsatisfied."

Let me break in here - I can't argue with Gerrold's storytelling logic, here, and maybe it says more about me and having internalized a taste for bad TV trope junk food over the years, but I get an equal kick out of the trashier Trek episodes than the more refined. I agree that the more worthwhile stories eschew these conventions and challenge the audience (and the writers,) but it's an eternal question for me with regards to my own preferences. It's undeniably fun to watch a Trek story unfold in the manner described even as I fully recognize the validity of what he's saying.

Part of it, too, is that I take the long view when it comes to storytelling. The small dramas we debate from the last 50 years have been playing out more or less the same way for thousands of years. Humans like tropes and repetitive arcs. Then, we like to deconstruct those, defy them and improvise. But we always come round again to the same old, same old, then round to the deconstruction again. (This is expressed more eloquently in things like Joseph Campbell's Hero with a Thousand Faces among other places.)

This doesn't mean I see something like "Spock's Brain" as an equal storytelling achievement to "City on the Edge of Forever," only that I don't quite see the logic in getting too big a head about recognizing how one is superior to the other. Well-spotted, but I still know which one I want to watch when I want to have some beers and yell at the tv, and who's to say which is the "superior" approach?

I'd argue both activate the same synapses in the brain or provide equal capacity for degree of "cosmic revelations." (As would Chuck Klosterman or Doug Coupland. Not bad company to keep.) There's plenty of room for both Tarkovsky and Sharknado.

Gerrold continues:

"There are 2 ways in which Format turns into Formula. One is a hardening of the arteries; the other is erosion. Hardening of the arteries is the process by which a TV show limits itself by setting up conditions which will affect all episodes that come after. The Kirk/ Spock relationship is a good example. As the leads, it made sense for them to get all of the away missions (but) the focusing of attention on 2 characters who should not logically be placing themselves in physical danger but must do so regularly (minimizes the rest of the cast.)

Reaching perhaps its crescendo in this ridiculous business from The Motion Picture, where the Captain feels the need to put on a space-suit and personally go and fetch Mr. Spock.

"They were a good team, but the overuse of Mr. Spock enlarged him out of all proportion to everything else on the Enterprise. (...) This is the real pity of hardened arteries - the show ends up telling and retelling only variations of the same story because it has so limited itself it can't tell any other story."

John Byrne writes of this "Super-Spock Phenomenon" and how it played out on TOS:

"'Where No Man Has Gone Before' - a mysterious force at the edge of the galaxy causes strange change in people with ESP - but Spock is unaffected."

"'Dagger of the Mind' - Spock's first mind meld, but we're cautioned that it is extremely dangerous, requiring as it does that changes be made to the subject's nerves and blood vessels. Simon Van Gelder, when he submits voluntarily to it, is taking a huge risk."

"'Court Martial' - there is no mind meld in this one, but I find myself wondering why if the mind meld exists, courts still function in a manner so similar to our own time."

(Not to mention the psycho-tricorder, internal sensors, or any other aspect of twenty-third century culture we've seen.)

"In 'A Taste of Armageddon,' physical contact is no longer required, as Spock does a mind-meld through a wall and a door."

(This is referenced again in "By Any Other Name.")

"In 'The Changeling,' Spock is now able to use the mind-meld on a machine. By this point, it has become pure telepathy, no longer even requiring the subject to having a living brain."

"In 'The Omega Glory,' now Spock is actually able to do it without any physical contact, from across the room."

"In 'Spectre of the Gun,' for the first time Spock uses the mind meld to actually alter the thoughts of his subjects."

"And in 'Requiem for Methusaleh,' in an extraordinary invasion of Kirk's privacy, Spock, without Kirk's consent, uses the mind-meld to compel his Captain to forget a robot he's been humping."

And so on. 

Lastly, Gerrold's thoughts re: the 2nd example of format hardening to formula, erosion:

"The Enterprise becomes a cosmic meddler. Her attitudes were those of 20th century America - and so her mission was (seemingly) to spread truth, justice, and the American way. Star Trek missed the opportunity to question this attitude. While Kirk was occasionally in error, never was there a script in which the missions or goals were questioned. Of the surface, most of these intervention stories were intended to make very dramatic points.

"Individually, any episode was designed to make a specific point. Slavery is wrong. Exploitation is wrong. Racism is wrong, etc. Cumulatively (...) each situation had been constructed for Kirk to make that point (...) a set of straw men - or straw cultures, actually - for Kirk to knock down (...) If the local culture is tested and found wanting in the eyes of a starship Captain, he may make such changes as he feels necessary."

"Everytime Kirk knocked down a straw-man culture, he was re-enforcing the message: In the name of my morality, this is the proper action."

I wonder how he feels about MSNBC and Fox News? Or every State of the Union address going back several generations, for that matter...

There's a lot of value in all of the above insights. These are the things casual watchers don't really get about Trek , while Trekkies and Trekkers never stop discussing them. And while I'm certainly in the latter category, I'm on the more-forgiving side of it. Any story we tell ourselves is going to be of our own era/ on some level only meta-commentary on ourselves. Whether or not the story in question embraces this inevitability or goes to great pains to disguise it isn't as relevant to me as to whether or not it says something of value about said culture.

(Conversely, I enjoy the Ragnarok story not because it drives home perhaps the only essential truth we can all relate to - that we all pass away and life moves on without us - but because Thor fights a huge serpent with a hammer, the sky is filled with Valkyries, and a giant wolf eats Asgard. Sometimes the details don't even need to have "value," in other words; they just need to kick a little ass.)

And I'd argue that TOS is if not loaded with than certainly generous with opportunities for the viewer to question whether or not Starfleet/ Kirk's course of action is morally sound. Gerrold is correct to point out that we never really hear much internal debate, i.e. Spock and Kirk don't voice this debate in the dialogue. But many episodes ("A Private Little War," "Who Mourns for Adonis?" "This Side of Paradise," "Return of the Archons," just to name a few) pose questions that (at least for this viewer) provoked the discussion Gerrold charges TOS as failing to elicit. I prefer it being left to the viewer, actually, rather than just putting the words in the Captain's mouth.

"You'd make an excellent fascist, Captain."

At other times, I get the impression the Genes (or whomever) are telling me they actually do think Kirk is right to knock over whatever culture he's knocking over, and I enjoy that aspect of it, too, as then I can say "Wait, what?" This isn't 24, after all, (or the real world) where the government's right to torture you in the name of nebulous national security is the holy communion of every episode; actual ambiguity and debate is part and parcel of the Trek experience, even when you disagree with the outcome. (And even when every civilization in the vastness of the universe is predicated on the unchallenged superiority of humanoid life.)

All of which is stuff I wanted to take into account when approaching this project. I knew when I started the Captain's Blog that I'd save TOS for last and do a top 50 of some kind. But I kept changing my mind on how to determine what 50 episodes. Eventually, after much trial and error and many nights of heroic screencapping, I came upon a grading system I liked and began sorting it out. Which is where we'll pick up next time.