These arrived in the mail this week...

so I got an early start on my summer reading.

Star Trek TOS S03E08: For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky

Summary:

Enterprise is targeted by primitive missiles. The Enterprise easily shoots them down and the crew begins to trace the origin of the attack. Meanwhile in sick bay, Bones has completed his annual physicals and discovered that he has an incurable blood disease, xenopolycythemia. He tells Kirk that he (Bones) only has a year to live. Kirk has to inform Starfleet to request a replacement.

Bejeweled disk hats, bright plaids.
Just because you're on a planet-ship doesn't mean you lack style.

The origin of the missile attack is traced to a round asteroid which is moving on an independent course. It’s really a ship with an asteroid-like shell and a breathable atmosphere inside. It’s about a year away from colliding with a populated planet. Kirk, Spock, and Bones beam down to the asteroid (because the 23rd century is pretty chill with letting all the top officers go on away missions together). Although their instruments say the ship is uninhabited, they are attacked. The high priestess Natira says they are on Yonada. The ship has been in flight for 10,000 years. The people do not realize that it is a ship; they believe they are on a planet. Kirk, Spock, and Bones are taken underground where Natira addresses an oracle. The oracle gives the three of them an electric shock that knocks them to the ground.

When they awake later, they are in a different room. Kirk wants to tell the people that Yonada is a ship so they can work together in avoiding collision with the planet. Spock points out that this would be a violation of the Prime Directive. Kirk effectively shrugs. An old man arrives and gives them an herb to help them recoup after the shock. He tells them that he once climbed the mountains and realized that things weren’t as they seemed. “For the world is hollow and I have touched the sky.” It is clear that sharing this information is causing the old man physical pain. A device under his skin is hurting him and ultimately kills him.

Bones and Natira share an attraction. Kirk makes a snide remark that basically shows how jealous he is that Bones gets the romantic role this episode. Bones distracts Natira so that Kirk and Spock can find the control room of the ship. Spock recognizes Fabrini writing near the temple; they deduce that the people on board are descendants. Natira shows up. Kirk and Spock hide and overhear her ask the oracle to let Bones be her mate. The oracle says he may but only if he worships the creators and gets “the instrument of obedience” put in his head. Then Then, Kirk and Spock are shocked again and charged with sacrilege.

I wonder if I could pull off that eye make-up.

Bones tells Natira that he’ll stay but begs for Kirk and Spock’s lives. She agrees to let them go back to the Enterprise as a favor to Bones. Bones receives the instrument of obedience and marries Natira. He is shown a sacred book that supposedly contains all the information about Yonada, but the people are not supposed to read it until they reach a new world. Bones contacts Kirk to tell him about the book, but the device in his head knocks him out. Kirk and Spock beam back down and remove the device. Kirk throws Natira around a bit then tells her about the spaceship. Her device causes her pain, but she listens to him. She doesn't understand why the creators would lie to the people, but she can't deny the truth once it is presented to her.

Kirk and Spock use the book in the temple to find the hidden control room. Spock finds a way to redirect Yonada so the collision will be avoided. While in the control room, they find the data banks of Fabrini knowledge, which includes a cure for xenopolycythemia. Natira tells Bones that even though she is free from the oracle’s control, she is choosing to stay willingly and continue on the same path. She also tells Bones that he should go back to his ship and live his life.

Lesson:

There is a reoccurring theme in Trek where a group of people mistakenly attribute a superior technology as a god. In this episode it goes even further in that the people don’t even understand that they are on a ship. Kirk wants to free them of their ignorance and show them the truth. There is a lot of talk about hiding the truth, blind obedience, and ignoring outsiders. It’s a clear secular humanist message: let go of beliefs you were taught and see things for what they are.

But only Natira is freed from the device, and she still chooses to stay. While it probably just a plot device that she stay so they didn’t have to deal with her on the Enterprise in later episodes, I think her choice to stay can say something about faith as well. There is a difference in those who believe blindly or for fear of punishment and those that see the truth and choose to follow the faith. Natira knows that they are on a ship and that the oracle is a computer, but she still believes that her people’s ways are beneficial. She also knows that everyone will learn the truth soon and will need a leader to help with that transition. So while the episode appears to be anti-religion, I think it is really anti-blind obedience, and that it allows a faith when it is informed and freely chosen.

Quotes:

Oracle: “Learn what it means to be our enemy before you learn what it means to be our friend.”

McCoy: “We’re strangers to each other.”

Natira: “Is that not the nature of men and women? That the pleasure is in the learning of each other?”

Kirk: “Bones, this isn’t a planet. It’s a spaceship, on a collision course with Daran V.”

McCoy: “I’m on a kind of collision course myself, Jim.”

Natira: “You’ve released him from his vow of obedience.”

Kirk: “We’ve freed him from the cruelty of your oracle.”

Natira: “Is truth not truth for all? I must know the truth of the world!”

Star Trek VIII: First Contact

Summary:

Since yesterday was First Contact/ Zefrem Cochrane Day, I had to watch First Contact, as if I really needed the reason. The movie opens with the Picard dreaming that he in the Borg hive, remembering the time he was assimilated and became Locutus. Picard is awoken by a message from Starfleet that the Borg have reached Federation space, with a direct course for Earth (obviously). Instead of being thrust into the battle, the Enterprise-E  is sent off to the Neutral Zone; the higher ups don’t want Picard near Borg because it would be “unstable.”

Let’s talk about the Borg for a minute. I love the Borg; they’re a great enemy. They’re unfeeling and calculating and can hurt you in much worse ways than killing you. The terror comes from knowing that if captured, you won’t be enslaved or killed, but you will became that which you hate. I also love that they are genuinely stronger than the Federation. It takes all of Starfleet to fight one Borg ship. (Disregarding some Voyager for a moment, which I think overused/weakened the Borg) it’s nice having a superior enemy face the Federation in battle. And they do some heavy damage. Of course the good guys win in the end, but I love an enemy strong enough and scary enough to convince me that it might just turn out differently.

So, the Enterprise is out in the Neutral Zone and hear the reports of Borg attacks back home. We’re eight minutes in, and Picard decides following orders would make for a boring movie and conquered Earth, so they disobey and high-tail it to the battle. (I believe in Appalachian to Trek translation, high-tail is approximately warp 8.5.)

The Enterprise arrives, and the first thing the Captain does is take control of the entire fleet. I’m not sure how authorization works in Starfleet in wartime, but I’m pretty sure it’s more regulated than a renegade captain just declaring himself in charge. The fleet successfully blows up the Borg cube, but not before the Borg release a sphere that creates a temporal vortex. The timeline changes, and Earth is now 100% Borg. The Enterprise is close enough to the vortex that they remain unaffected, so they follow the Borg back 300 years to undo the damage.

Earth 300 years ago (or rather, 50 years from now) is repairing from WWIII, economic stability, and social riots. There is a small group of people living in Bozeman, Montana, including Zefram Cochrane, who is a day away from making his historical first warp flight. His flight will grab the attention of Vulcans and initiate first contact. The Borg want to prevent first contact so they can assimilate Earth easily.

Bev is rocking mid-21st century style.

 The crew beams down. Picard and Data find Cochrane’s ship, the Phoenix, which is made from an old nuclear missile. That is where they meet Lily Sloane who is kind of freaked out by the whole android, starship, time travel deal. Riker runs into Troi and Cochrane drinking in a bar. Tequila-drinking Troi is way more fun than synthahol-drinking sober Troi. The Enterprise could have used some real alcohol on board. Cochrane turns out to be more angry drunk than historic hero like they all imagine. Riker tries to explain the situation to Cochrane, who rather reluctantly agrees to continue with his flight as planned. He hates all the attention the visitors from the future are giving him; they think he is a noble dreamer while he claims he is only doing what he does for the money.

Classy BAMF.

Back on board, the Borg arrive and begin taking over. Apparently a 24th century starship orbiting 21st century Earth draws attention. They want to turn the ship into a beacon to call more Borg into the Alpha Quadrant. Picard and Worf both lead teams to clear the decks and try to regain control of the ship. Picard runs into Sloane and attempts to explain everything to her. They hid from the Borg in the holosuite, because…Dixon Hill. Phasers don’t work against Borg, but holographic machine guns do (obviously). Side note: Why can you disengage safety protocols on the holodeck? That’s just… unsafe.

Data is captured and taken to the Borg Queen. And the Borg Queen is all over Data. He has the encrypted codes that would give the Borg total control of the Enterprise. But she seems way more into him on a sexual level. I’m not sure if I’m supposed to be turned on or repulsed. She activates his emotion chip and begins a process of turning him into an organic being.

Uncomfortably sexy.

A team takes a spacewalk on the hull of the Enterprise to disrupt the beacon the Borg are trying to send. With no help coming, the only Borg threat is on the Enterprise. Worf and Crusher suggest blowing up the ship, but Picard is having none of that. They just got the Enterprise-E and now his crew wants to destroy it like the last one. Picard calls Worf a coward and throws him off the bridge. Then Picard walks off, leaving Crusher in charge of the whole fighting off Borg business. Picard and Sloane have it out; she makes him face the fact that he is still angry at the Borg for personal reasons and is hunting them for revenge, not for saving humanity. He agrees to initiate the self-destruct.

Side note: I’ve always been team Picard-Crusher, and while it is addressed and makes sense why they never wind up together, I really, really want them to. It also makes me a bit defensive when Picard has relationships with other women (or when Crusher sleeps with her heirloom ghost). But I really like Sloane. I’m not getting overly romantic vibes or anything, but I think even if I were, I’d still like her. She isn’t letting these people from the future use their technology and knowledge to make her feel inferior; she steps right up to their level. She calls Picard out on his flaws while Crusher is on the bridge following orders she disagrees with.

While everyone evacuates the ship, Picard stays behind in hopes of recuing Data. While watching all the escape pods leave Enterprise and head to Earth, I can’t help but think 1. didn’t anyone on earth notice those dozens of little ships? It’s the 21st century; we can see things in orbit and 2. I don’t believe that all those pods make it made to the ship. There are some 24th century crewmen stuck in the past. Anyway, Picard goes down to engineering and faces the Borg Queen. He offers to willingly give himself over to the Borg in exchange for Data’s freedom. But Data works with the Borg Queen instead and stops the self-destruct.

Meanwhile on Earth, Riker and La Forge tag along for the first warp flight, because they can. Just as they are getting ready to launch into warp, Data under the Borg Queen’s directive, fires torpedoes at them. But the torpedoes miss; Data sabotaged the attack and gives Picard a chance to escape. Data floods the room with plasma (I think?), wiping out the Borg, including the Queen. So the Enterprise is saved, the Phoenix is saved, and first contact happens as planned (and Cochrane doesn’t shoot first, like in the Mirror universe).

Then there is the whole getting back to the correct time problem. Something about the moon hiding the Enterprise’s warp signature from the Vulcans even though the Vulcans were able to pick up the Phoenix’s. And don’t tell me the Vulcans also missed the Enterprise calling back all those escape pods. The Enterprise casually recreates the Borg time vortex and goes home. The Vulcans hang out to drink and learn rock n’ roll, which is fun enough for me to overlook the time travel issues. Actually, I’m not much of a stickler on the science stuff, and you want the movie to end with Cochrane and the Vulcans, not worrying about the technicalities of making it back to the 24th century. 

This is my favorite of the TNG movies. Exploration for its own sake, diplomacy, questions of morals and humanity, technobabble, action, and a dash of interspecies sexual tension: it has everything that makes Trek Trek. 

Quotes: 

Data: “Captain, I believe I speak for everyone here, sir, when I say to hell with our orders.”

Picard: “They’ll assimilate the Enterprise, and then, Earth.”

Sloane: “Borg? Sounds Swedish.”

Emergency Medical Hologram: “I’m a doctor, not a doorstop.”

Troi: “Timeline? This is no time to argue about time. We don’t have the time.”

Troi: “[First contact] unites humanity in a way that no one ever thought possible, when they realize they are not alone in the universe. Poverty, disease, war, they’ll all be gone within the next 50 years.”

Borg Queen: “I am the beginning, the end, the one who is many. I am the Borg.”

Cochrane: “I’ve heard enough about the great Zefram Cochrane. I don’t know who writes your history books or where you get your information from, but you people have got some pretty funny ideas about me. You all look at me as if I’m some kind of saint or visionary or something.”
Riker: “I don’t think you’re saint, Doc, but you did have a vision.”

Picard: “In my century, we don’t succumb to revenge. We have a more evolved sensibility.”
Sloane: “Bullshit!”

Sloane: “Captain Ahab has to go hunt his whale.”

Picard: “Not again. The line must be drawn here! This far; no farther! And I will make them pay for what they’ve done!”

Data: “Resistance is futile.”

Cochrane: “And you people, you’re all astronauts on some kind of star trek.” (I see what you did there.)

First Contact Day

On April 5, 2063, man perfects warp drive. As a result, the Vulcans make first contact with humans. It's a day of both technological and diplomatic advancement for mankind.Today marks 50 years to the day before these events are supposed to occur. Is that a negative 50th anniversary, a future anniversary, or a pre-anniversary? Jumping around in time make verb tenses tricky.  
 
Whatever it’s called, according to Star Trek canon, we’re only 50 years and a worldwide nuclear war away from meeting extraterrestrial intelligent life.  So happy Zefram Cochrane Day!

 

The Twilight Zone S01E01, Where is Everybody?

Summary:

For my TV commentaries, I figured there was nowhere better to start than the first episode of The Twilight Zone. (Side note: I love how Netflix lists the cast of the show as solely Rod Serling. I get that he is the only constant on the show, but it still made me smile, because Rod Serling is awesome and deserves solo listing.) In this episode, a man wonders upon a town. Music is playing in the jukebox; coffee is brewing. But there are no people. The man doesn’t know who he is or where he is. He wanders from building to building. He briefly thinks he’s found someone, but she turns out to only be a mannequin. Why are mannequins ALWAYS creepy in TV or movies? In the drugstore, he fixes himself a sundae. He sees dozens of copies of the same book: The Last Man on Earth. Evening comes, and all the lights come on. He goes to the theater, which is advertising Battle Hymn. That reminds him that he’s in the Air Force. So he knows he’s American and in the Air Force, but still doesn’t know who he is.

He’s running around the theater and smashes into a mirror. It reminds me of the scene in Contact where the girl is running down the hall to get the medicine. It’s shot where you think you’re watching the real person and only when that person reaches the mirror do you realize you’ve been watching the reflection. Everything is backward; everything is a little off. It’s a trick which could be easily overused, but in these two contexts make a good impact.

The man runs out into the street and sees a large eye (in the optometrist’s window), adding to the fear that he is being watched. He begins panicking, pressing the “walk” button at a cross-stop and crying, “Help me, please! Help me! Somebody’s looking at me!” etc. Cut to a room of military men listening to his pleas. It turns out the man is in an isolation booth, part of an Air Force experiment. The “walk” button is a panic button in the booth. He is pulled from the booth in which he had been confined without any contact for 484 hours, or as an officer put it, “That’s roughly equivalent to a trip to the moon, several orbits, and return.” As they carry him out of the hanger, the man looks up to the full moon and says, “Don’t go away. We’ll be up there in a little while.”

Lesson:

The moral of the story is that man is not meant to be alone. We’re communal creatures. We need to be heard and understood by other humans. Alone, we go mad.

I often forget that the heyday of Space Age popularity took place before we reached the moon. This episode is from 1959, a full decade before Apollo 11, and even a few years before Yuri Gagarin’s orbit. But the seed is already there; we’re going to the moon. Even if it’s uncomfortable. We test the limits of the human body and mind just to see how far we can go.

Isolation experiments haven’t stopped. As recently as 2011, there have been isolation experiments on small crews to see how they would fare on a trip to Mars. For 520 days, a crew of six (3 Russians, a Frenchman, an Italian/Columbian, and a Chinese citizen) simulated a full mission to Mars including simulated Mars-walks and a realistic 25-minute time delay to headquarters. The conclusion of the experiment was that all participants completed the experiment in good physical and psychological health. But maybe that’s because they had five other people to bond with. Real solitude flips reality, where only the concoctions of the mind seem real.

I think this was a good episode to serve as the pilot. It latches on to the popularity of space travel, but shows the darker, more technical side of it –the planning, the experiments, the moral questions that came with the Space Race. It has a good twist ending; you’re lead to believe that something is wrong with the town, but it turns out that something is wrong with the man. The town is a delusion. It is a good introduction to the Twilight Zone.

Quotes:

“There is a fifth dimension beyond that which is known to man. It is a dimension as vast as space and timeless as infinity. It is the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition, and it lies between the pit of man's fears and the summit of his knowledge. This is the dimension of imagination. It is an area we call the Twilight Zone.”

“I don’t remember who I am. It’s a real oddball thing, but when I woke up this morning…well, I didn’t exactly wake up. I just found myself out on that road, walking.”

“I wish I could shake that crazy feeling of being watched.”

“What happened to him is that he cracked. Delusions of some kind, we assume.”

“Where did you think you were?” 

“A place I don’t want to go again, sir.”

“We can feed the stomach…we can pump oxygen in and waste material out, but there’s one thing we can’t simulate. That’s a very basic need—man’s hunger for companionship.”

“Next time it won’t be in a hanger.” 

“No, next time you’ll really be alone.”

Trivia:

The opening to the show was originally written, “There is a sixth dimension beyond that which is known to man…” but when no one could name a fifth dimension, the opening was reworded.

Serling’s original pilot was titled “The Happy Place” and was about a society where citizens were killed when they reached age 60. The network thought the subject matter too dark. The theme was explored again in season two with “The Obsolete Man.”