The Corbomite Maneuver

A friend of mine kept talking about this episode, so I was bit worried that it might disappoint; unnecessarily, as it turned out: this has to be one of my favourite episodes to-date, in fact:

• I loved how professional everyone was throughout the opening (well, except for Bones, maybe :-) ).
• Kirk’s poise during the encounter with the beacon was great! It just added to the tension.
• The turbolift dialogue between Kirk and Bones was fantastic: “I never say that… I never say that either.”
• The weight of a captain’s responsibility continues to grow on Kirk right up ’til the poker conversation; you can see it in his face and posture — great stuff!

Dagger of the Mind

Yet another good episode:

• Again, a really intense opening; in particular, Dr. Van Gelder’s (played superbly by Morgan Woodward) initial psychotic episode in the sick bay.
• I recognized James Gregory right away, but I’m still not certain what memories are triggering. I watched a lot of Barney Miller as a kid, but Gregory made brief appearances on many of the other shows I watched too (e.g., Love Boat, Wonderful World of Disney, etc.); and then there’s the original Manchurian Candidate, although I was much older when I saw that.
• The neural neutralizer was like something right out of early Doctor Who, sound effects and all. ;-)

Miri

Another good episode. From my notes:

• That first encounter with a humanoid was really intense: there was a terrible conviction is his eyes as he spat, “Liar!” and his make-up absolutely hideous.
• I loved the new vocabulary, delivered so non-chalantly.
• The taunting of Spock and the guards in the alleyway gave me chills… And Ring Around The Rosie was a particularly nice (read: grim) touch, given the possible plague; oh, how I hate that rhyme. (I’ve since read that many think that the theory of plague allusions in the rhyme are baseless; interesting, but I still dislike the rhyme.)
• It was around this time that I noticed how much Miri (played by Kim Darby) reminded me of Linda Blair. *shudder*
• Jahn (the leader of the ‘onlies’) was great! Very Lord of the Flies, obviously.
• While trying to find a vaccine was an admirable goal, presumably the only ones it would help at that point would be the remaining crew on the Enterprise (allowing Spock to return at some point) and possibly some of the younger onlies: your body can’t build up antibodies while it’s fighting a disease, as I understand it, anyway. Oh well; minor point. (Again, later research shows that vaccination after a person has been infected is not pointless.)
• I wonder whether this episode made the short list of possible starting points for the script of the second Star Trek feature-length film; there were certainly many loose ends.