what’s a Berthold ray? Archive

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Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “Déjà Q”

dejaq285“Déjà Q”
Written by Richard Danus
Directed by Les Landau

Season 3, Episode 13
Original air date: February 5, 1990
Star date: 43539.1

Mission summary

Enterprise is rendering assistance to Bre’el IV, which is about to say “goodnight, moon”— an asteroidal body on a decaying orbit will slam into the planet in twenty-nine hours unless they can devise a way to shove it back where it belongs. It’s just too damn big for the tractor beams to nudge it, which La Forge eloquently compares to “an ant pushing a tricycle.” To further complicate the situation, they’re paid an unexpected visit by an old adversary: Q literally drops in on the Bridge, in the buff. He smirks and greets them with, “Red alert.”

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Star Trek Re-Watch: “This Side of Paradise”

“This Side of Paradise”
Written by D.C. Fontana (story by Nathan Butler and D.C. Fontana)
Directed by Ralph Senensky

Season 1, Episode 24
Production episode: 1×25
Original air date: March 2, 1967
Star date: 3417.3

Mission summary
The Enterprise is tasked with a rescue mission to an Earth colony on planet Omicron Ceti III, which is being bombarded with lethal Berthold rays that disintegrate animal tissue under prolonged exposure. They don’t expect to find any survivors, and on first glance it seems that all 150 colonists are in fact dead, as there is no response to their hails. Brief exposure to the radiation should be safe, so Kirk beams down with a landing party consisting of Mr. Spock, Dr. McCoy, Lt. Sulu, Mr. DeSalle, and Mr. Kelowitz. They wander through the empty streets of a small town farming community, which oddly resembles a Hollywood backlot. Kirk laments the apparent loss of life in the colony, “another dream that failed,” but then a man appears and welcomes them to the planet. He identifies himself as Elias Sandoval, the leader of the group that left Earth four years before.

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