re: Star Trek: TOS Watchers - Season 1 Wrapup *Page 25*

Maybe we can't stroll to the music of a lute. We must march to the sound of drums.

Another classic episode.

Interesting that Kirk drove away the spores by being upset at the idea of leaving the ship. Perhaps the Enterprise is truly his Paradise.

Lol at McCoy bristling at the idea of being put to work.

Wonderful acting by Nimoy. The first time Spock was happy.

*THE DEVIL IN THE DARK*



A mysterious creature is killing miners. Kirk and Spock investigate the matter.

A gripping tale of hunter and hunted, a reconsidered definition of the nature of life and humanity.

Features, probably, the best Vulcan mind meld in all of Star Trek history - and one of the best, most creative monsters.

This is (by production order) the 4th episode directed by Joseph Pevney. Looking at his resume, he's probably the best TOS director, with Marc Daniels as a close second. He held on until just a few years ago, dying in 2008 at the age of 96.

Along with Gene Coon, Pevney is another guy that Roddenberry pulled from Wagon Train alumni. Pevney had a brief acting career in the late 40s, switched to directing low budget films in 1950 and switched to television in 1961 - directing episodes of everything from Going My Way, to the Munsters in the 60s, to The Hardy Boys and Trapper John M.D. in the 70s/80s.

Liked, but did not love, this episode. Kirk seemed somewhat predisposed to not killing the creature, which is fine, but seemed at odds with the earlier The Man Trap , where he displayed little hesitance to kill a "last of its kind" creature who was also killing people. Also seemed at odds with him being hellbent on killing the "cloud creature" in the later episode Obsession. Still, a good one.

Shatner's father died during the shooting yet he insisted on finishing the filming, showing what a professional he was. I seriously doubt I could've done the same.

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It's been a decade at least. And here I was all impressed with myself. :sad banana:

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It was the first time he said, "I'm a doctor, not a [something other than a doctor]."

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The one thing missing from this episode is Chekov

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Chekov didn't come in until the second season. A glitch in TWOK, and canon is silent about the encounter. However, it must be assumed there was an off-screen encounter between a newly assigned Ensign Chekov and Khan. Walter Koenig jokes that Chekov made Khan wait a long time to use the bathroom.

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was very impressed with the sets. The caverns and tunnels look great. The Horta itself was also well done.

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You had a few shows that were really trying back then - Outer Limits (of which TOS reused a number of props), Lost in Space and, of course, TOS. Twilight Zone was hit and miss, and much more focused on telling the story (and I don't mean that as an insult). For all the crap that TOS catches for being cheesy (in hindsight), many of their episodes contained top notch sets, props and special effects, especially considering the time, budget and technology restraints under which they were operating.

Devil in the Dark kind of set the stage for a recurring pattern of "underground" sets in Star Trek, generally: TWOK featured an underground cavern prominently, TNG had a decent number of underground or cavernous type sets and DS9 made extensive use of such sets, both Bajoran and during the Dominion War.

This episode, particularly, had one of the best combinations of setting, lighting, dialogue, acting (particularly among the Big 3 and guests), pacing, suspense, and yet with that positive, optimistic ending - a very satisfying chapter of TOS. And all of this was accomplished with merely a few minutes on board the Enterprise.

*ERRAND OF MERCY*



First appearance of the Klingon race in Star Trek, and we get a wonderful appearance from John Colicos as the augment version of Captain Kor (he would reprise the character as an old man, reverted back to normal Klingon physiology, in 3 episodes of DS9).

The original plan was to have Colicos come back and have Kor be the Klingon answer to Kirk, but he wasn't available for the Season 2 (William Campbell took the role in Tribbles, and they changed the name of the Klingon captain to Koloth), and then neither were available in Season 3 (so Michael Ansara played Captain Kang). I guess the good news is that we got to see 3 different takes: Colicos' Kor is a cold, efficient, brutal administrator, Campbell's Koloth is a brash, unpredictable schemer and Ansara's Kang is a proud, noble warrior (and I think that Ansara's is the closest to the vision adopted by TNG and DS9 - and even further, all three "augment" captains from TOS appeared as old men, and portrayed by their TOS actors in an episode of DS9 called "Blood Oath").

In Errand of Mercy, Kirk and Spock try to open relations with a seemingly primitive, peaceful people, primarily in an attempt to deny the planet to the Klingons. Instead, they get caught up in a brutal Klingon occupation of the planet.

Well, as with many of these encounters, the primitive race of Organians are not only immune to the Klingons' methods, ultimately enforce a peace treaty on the warring parties.

However, the episode focuses on Kirk and Spock engaging in clandestine sabotage missions in ways similar to the French Resistance of WWII (in real time, a mere 20 years prior to the production of Star Trek). This conflict would foreshadow the Bajoran Resistance and Maquis struggles against Cardassia in TNG and DS9.