After several busy weeks I finally got around to seeing the new AbramsTrek. I didn’t like the first one because it felt like a lame action movie with a Trek skin grafted over it. This is much, much worse. Warning: this will be a spoiler post, so do not proceed if you have not seen the movie and wish to remain unspoiled.
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Screenplay by: Steve Meerson & Peter Krikes and
Harve Bennett & Nicholas Meyer
Story by: Leonard Nimoy & Harve Bennett
Produced by: Harve Bennett
Directed by: Leonard Nimoy
Release date: November 26, 1986
Stardate: 8390.0 (aka 1986)
Mission Summary
The crew of the Enterprise has been court-martialed by Klingon request for the ship stolen and the lives lost in Star Trek III. Fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately, a mysterious probe that disables just about everything is headed straight for Earth. The probe sends a signal no one can understand, and when it doesn’t get a response it begins to vaporize the Earth’s oceans and ionize its atmosphere: a recipe for disaster. Spock, newly born again, discovers that the signal is the song of the humpback whale: extinct since the 21st century. In classic Star Trek fashion, the crew go back in time to 1986 San Francisco to nab themselves some humpback whales.
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“The Time Trap”
Written by Joyce Perry
Directed by Hal Sutherland
Season 1, Episode 12
Production episode: 22010
Original air date: November 24, 1973
Star date: 5267.2
Mission summary
Enterprise is investigating the “Delta Triangle,” a region of space where starships have been disappearing for centuries. It’s almost as if the suits back at Starfleet are trying to get rid of them.
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“Mudd’s Passion”
Written by Stephen Kandel
Directed by Hal Sutherland
Season 1, Episode 10
Production episode: 22008
Original air date: November 10, 1973
Star date: 4978.5
Mission summary
Enterprise makes a special trip to Motherlode in the Arcadian star system in search of one Harcourt Fenton Mudd, wanted on several counts of being annoying. They find the infamous swindler hawking a love potion to the human and ursine miners on the planet, claiming that all it takes is a drop of a magic liquid to compell any woman to love them with a single touch. “It matters not whether you are young, old, fat, ugly or repugnant,” he assures the crowd–and what better way to prove three out of four than by a personal demonstration? He brings up a young blonde who implores, “Please, darling, come back to the ship with me.” Yecch!
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“Yesteryear”
Written by D.C. Fontana
Directed by Hal Sutherland
Season 1, Episode 2
Production episode: 22003
Original air date: September 15, 1973
Star date: 5373.4
Mission summary
The Enterprise crew is assigned to help a bird creature and a woman historian with their survey of Federation history via Harlan Ellison’sTM Guardian of Forever, but they somehow end up altering the timeline. Again. Whoops!
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“The Cage”
Written by Gene Roddenberry
Directed by Robert Butler
Original Pilot
Production episode: 1
Original air date: October 4, 1988
Star date: Unknown
Mission summary
Without any helpful narration over the opening credits, or even some kind of “captain’s log,” it’s hard to tell just what’s going on here. This ship, which is called U.S.S. Enterprise, seems to be on a mission in space. The duration of its voyage and its purpose is unclear, but my instincts tell me the crew is seeking out new life and new civilizations, or vice versa, as the case might be. But they’re certainly going where no one has gone before.
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“All Our Yesterdays”
Written by Jean Lisette Aroeste
Directed by Marvin Chomsky
Season 3, Episode 23
Production episode: 3×23
Original air date: March 14, 1969
Star date: 5943.7
Mission summary
Enterprise arrives at Sarpeidon three-and-a-half hours before its star, Beta Niobe, goes supernova, only to discover that the planet has already been evacuated. Where everyone has gone is anyone’s guess, since Sarpeidon hadn’t yet discovered space travel. A strong power reading on the surface leads Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock, and Dr. McCoy to some sort of archive, where they are greeted by an old librarian, Mr. Atoz. The poor guy is so happy to have patrons to serve, he doesn’t even notice they’re out-of-towners or bother to check their library cards. Kirk asks him where everyone went, but Atoz is too senile or focused on helping them to give him a straight answer.
ATOZ: It depended on the individual, of course. If you wish to trace a specific person, I’m sorry, but that information is confidential.
MCCOY: No, no particular person, just people in general. Where did they go?
ATOZ: Ah, you find it difficult to choose, is that it? Yes, a wide range of alternatives is a mixed blessing, but perhaps I can help. Would you step this way, please?
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“Is There in Truth No Beauty?”
Written by Jean Lisette Aroeste
Directed by Ralph Senensky
Season 3, Episode 5
Production episode: 3×07
Original air date: October 18, 1968
Star date: 5630.7
Mission summary
Enterprise is on routine taxi duty, escorting a less-than-routine diplomat back to his homeworld: Ambassador Kollos is a Medusan, “a race of beings who are formless, so utterly hideous” that just looking at one will drive the beholder mad. But on the up side, they’re very intelligent and have wonderful personalities.
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“The Enterprise Incident”
Written by D.C. Fontana
Directed by John Meredyth Lucas
Season 3, Episode 2
Production episode: 3×04
Original air date: September 27, 1968
Star date: 5431.4
Mission Summary:
On the bridge of Enterprise, Captain Kirk snaps at Chekov and Spock for no apparent reason. But it’s not just a case of the Mondays–Doctor McCoy explains that Kirk’s been short-tempered and (in scientific terms) acting like a total jackass to just about everyone onboard for days now. There’s no getting around it: Captain Kirk has come down with a severe case of douchebaggery.
Kirk turns to Sulu and orders him to change course.
KIRK: Come about to one eight five, mark three.
SULU: But Sir, that’ll lead us directly into the Romulan Neutral Zone.
Sulu, Chekov, Spock, and Uhura all look around at each other nervously. Mr. Scott and Uhura discuss very loudly that no order has come through from command to take this measure, and Kirk sharply instructs them to shut their pieholes.
But it’s too late. In the Neutral Zone, two–no, three–Klingon-designed Romulan ships appear from the ether, surrounding Enterprise.
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“The Menagerie” Part II
Written by Gene Roddenberry
Directed by Robert Butler
Season 1, Episode 12
Production episode: 1×16
Original air date: November 24, 1966
Star date: 3013.1
Mission summary
The episode begins with an unusually lengthy Captain’s Log entry, recapping the incredible events of the previous episode. Then we dive back into Spock’s court-martial, now in closed session with just Kirk, Spock, Commodore Mendez, and Captain Pike in attendance. Just like Heroes, there’s no way to block the Talosian images, and no one thinks to just turn off the monitor.
Onscreen, the younger Captain Pike awakens in an episode of The Twilight Zone, inside a glass cage with hypercephalic beings studying him. They speak about him telepathically, analyzing his thoughts and predicting his actions. They say he will throw himself against the “transparency” in a “display of physical prowess,” just before he does. Pike speaks to them, insisting he’ll find a way to escape, but they ignore him as though he were a dumb creature and begin planning some experiments on him.
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