The Counter-Clock Incident

*** (3 stars out of 5)

"The Counter-Clock Incident" is a wonderful story- if you don't like stories that make sense.

Federation-Ambassador-at-large for the past 20 years, Commodore Robert April was the first Captain of the Enterprise. He's reached mandatory retirement age: 75.

He reminisces about the days of old: overseeing the assembly of the ship at the San Francisco Naval Yards. Back when hand lasers cost a credit and you could cane a Tellarite across the shinbone for talking out of turn.

April's wife Sarah designed many of the medical tools Bones uses today. Is she buttering her own bread a little? "First medical officer aboard a ship equipped with warp drive"? Really? There's been warp drive for two centuries! Nobody brought a doctor along before?

Sarah April has a Capella IV flower, with a lifespan of a few hours. Kind of a grisly corsage, but o.k., it helps the plot along.

Returning to the Beta Niobe supernova the ship tries to catch a backwards-talking woman speeding 26 warp factors over the limit, but are dragged along...

...into a reverse cosmos with black stars in a white void, where time moves backward.

The star Amphion, previously dead, came to life here, and their guide Karla Five escorts them to her world, Arret. See, it's Terra backwards! Karla's son Karl Four is a sprightly old man, and her father Karl Six is a senile infant.

"Most logical" says Spock. I completely disagree. If Karl Four and Karla Five are getting younger and younger at the same rate, she will "reverse die" (in our reality, be born) before him. How is he supposed to reverse die without his mother? And how can Karla's father un-father her in a couple of decades if he's already on his first legs? It's not "most logical", it's insane.

Think about it for a second: you can be "reverse born" anywhere- hospital bed, operating table, the mouth of a Capellan power cat. But, all things being equal, you're going to "reverse die" inside your parents like everybody else. Ergo: parents can't be younger than their children, even here. Right? I think?

Oh, that's neither here nor there. Spock's logic is obviously working backwards here, too.

Adorable Mr. Sulu gets too young to remember how to drive. Kid Spock and Muppet Baby Arex were the oldest and second oldest crew on the bridge, manning the controls as renewed Robert April gave the orders taking them back home.

Starfleet says they're going to rethink that mandatory retirement age, which, as it turns out, will be lucrative for the movie franchise.

"It gave all of us a second life." says Sarah, in the final line of the series. Even though they squandered it by resetting themselves with the transporter. I shudder when the cure for the crew's case of youth is the transporter, but only because I don't like mixing my magic. A second life, indeed, just as this cartoon did for 'Star Trek'. A second life in a second decade.

It was a good series and we're long overdue for another Trek Toon, methinks. Just, please... not 'Star Trek Babies'.

Next up, a little time-reversal of our own. Tomorrow: a trip back to 2254 with Star Trek's first pilot. The one that didn't sell. "The Cage"- a five star episode with a five star guest reviewer.

How Sharper Than A Serpent's Tooth

** (2 stars out of 5)

An advanced probe approached the Federation homeworlds, took a scan, did a little jig and exploded. So Enterprise went looking for its maker.

A ceramic vessel cloaked as a dragon encases them in a force globe.

Dawson Walking Bear at the helm is a Comanche, and he recognized their foe as Kukulkan the winged serpent god from the legends of the Mayans and Aztecs. If he hadn't, apparently they all would have been destroyed out of hand. Either an endorsement for getting a good education or a reminder that space chariot gods are a-holes.

Walking Bear, McCoy, Scotty, and Kirk are beamed into a Mayan-esque city and activate a pyramid machine by turning four serpent-head statues. It's nothing like as entertaining as a rejected level for PS3's "Uncharted".

Kukulkan returns and makes loud, irrelevant pronouncements. He's half snake, half buzzard. He's Snuzzard! One of Disney's least popular Wuzzles.

Kooky lives alone with his pets. Unlike warrior humans, his animals have been rendered peaceful, even the notoriously nasty Capellan power cat.

Spock and Arex do something shiny with science to free the ship.

Kirk and Bones free the power cat and happy kitty becomes zappy kitty!

It seems Kukulkan was also "the Toltec's Quetzalcoatl, the Chinese dragon, and all the rest" Does Kirk mean the Professor and Mary Ann? Who is "and all the rest"?

The humans leave in peace, but without any vast knowledge. "The price was just too high."

What price? Did I miss Snuzzard putting a price on anything? I heard loneliness, a desire to enforce pacifism on four pacifists, great age, and unjustified blame. Is this god senile or did he trap the script in a force globe?

"How Sharper Than A Serpent's Tooth it is to have a thankless child", said King Lear, apparently. Kukulkan thought of humans as ungrateful kids, but I have to ask: what the hell did he ever do for them? We're smart enough to design our own pyramids, and horrible enough to work each other to death building them, thank you very much.

Even that much-vaunted calendar of his is about to expire. We'll just buy another one. It's not the end of the world or anything.

Albatross

*** (3 stars out of 5)

"Albatross". I'm an albatross! Flap, flap, flapping my albatross wings...plastic bag, plastic bag! Sorry, Tom Green ADD moment, where was I? Right! I'm still watching these Star Trek cartoons.

On planet Dramia III, Dr. McCoy is arrested for murder! He's charged with doling out inoculations like some sort of DOCTOR... plus causing the plague on Dramia II nineteen years ago.

The Dramians are effectively alien-looking aliens. Tendril hands, goat ears, orange bell bottoms. Easy to imagine them at the space disco.

Kirk prevents daring Dramian Demos making an attack on the ship by "accidentally" making it easy for him to sneak aboard... through an open shuttle door. Then they force him along on a fact-finding mission to ravaged Dramia II, a fog-shrouded world of "the walking dead". One of them makes a half-hearted attack on Kirk... which is still more action than 'The Walking Dead' season 2.

The sobbing ghouls are the families of the plague victims, remaining in the ruins and in caves out of grief. Except Kol-Tai, who claims to be the only survivor. He credits McCoy with saving him from the Saurian virus. They bring him along as a character witness.

Except Kol-Tai shows the first symptom of the plague: blue skin! Soon everyone but Spock is blue!

(Maybe I just discovered what was wrong with the "OH-ree-ons". And why we never heard from them again...)

Spock makes a jailbreak- only McCoy doesn't want to go! He wants to face trial and know the truth. Until Spock explains about the plague being back.

McCoy risks his life to make a diagnosis.

And he's much, much faster than that limping human wreckage Greg House, MD. He cures everyone in minutes once the pigmentation change is discovered to be a blue herring.

Rather than be beholden to Spock to rescue him next time he's jailed, McCoy tells Kirk 'Just let me rot."

Does the title reference Coleridge's "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner"? If so, I guess Bones is the albatross, but fortunately this time around no one hangs him around anybody's neck.

The Practical Joker

**** (4 stars out of 5)

Cartoon Romulans, despite being in Klingon ships, buck all the odds and actually appear in Romulan colours. They ambush and chase Enterprise thorough a strange energy field which infects the computer with a case of schadenfreude (happiness at the misfortune of others).

"Practical jokes" break out: dribble glasses, black eye microscopes, food machines throwing pie. (Unforgivable waste of pie, you ask me.)

Even the holographic Rec Room is malfunctioning. That never happens!

"At least we can enjoy our off-hour without worrying about practical jokes," sighs Uhura.

Off-HOUR?!? You only get ONE?

Kirk really IS a jerk.

Enterprise, now totally self-directed and laughing like a giddy schoolgirl, gets its revenge by tricking the Romulans into attacking a giant starship-shaped balloon. It seems Romulans fear disgrace more than death. And when their own computers go humiliation haywire they may be at risk for both, as our crew have been.

Sensing his chance, Kirk pretends he's petrified to go back through that terrible energy field- and tricks Enterprise into returning itself to boring old normal and safe. The gambit is now known throughout the fleet as "The Brer Rabbit Maneuver".

"The Practical Joker" is a hoot. I don't know what's not to like. You get Scotty crawling on ceilings, a back-sassing computer, and the first holodeck malfunction episode. Plus did I mention A GIANT STARSHIP BALLOON?!? It's the purest cheese, aged to perfection.

I noticed a credit that makes me laugh: music and sound effects by Horta-Mahana Corp. No doubt the silicon creature of Janus VI likes to tickle the old ivories.

Bem

* (1 star out of 5)

Meet Honorary Commander Ari bn "Bem" of the recently contacted Pandronians of planet Pandro.

He's an arrogant, preening ass. I mean it. I hate him. Not on sight. I love new aliens. But almost the second he opens his green gob. Strutting, insufferable prig.

He's tagging along, untrained, on the highly sensitive monitoring mission on Delta Theta III with possible dangerous lifeforms.

"Every planet is dangerous to the ignorant." sniffs Bem, re-affirming that it takes one to know one. Oh, and he constantly calls himself "This one". It's instantly irritating and it never stops.

Bem beams the crew into a lake and steals their equipment. For fun?

Later in the jungle, Bem disobeys Kirk by racing off on his own. Moments later he is captured by the local Sleestacks. What a load. The rescue attempt gets Kirk and Spock captured, too.

Bem is "observing", could have escaped at any time. Disassembles himself to return the stolen phasers. Spock identifies him as a colony creature. That much I understand, but what goes into making him such a tool?

Somehow, Kirk needs Spock to keep watch while he phasers bamboo locks. Why does this require any time at all, let alone multiple shots? It's frickin' wood!

Kirk apologizes to the miffed godlike ruling entity of Delta Theta III for intruding (but not for bringing Bem) and promises never to return.

Bem is nerd lingo for 'Bug-Eyed Monster'.

It is also the name of the naturally predatory but spiritually reformed alien Magog Rev Bem on 'Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda'.

It is a measure of how little I enjoy this story that I'd rather be watching 'Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda'. Maybe not the later seasons, but almost anything from seasons 1 & 2. Yecch.

The Pirates of Orion

** (2 stars out of 5)

The first misleading thing about "The Pirates of Orion" is the title. Yes, they're pirates. No, they're not from Orion. They're from somewhere called "OH-ree-on". Spelled the same.

Kirk tells Spock it's a nice change to play diplomat. Apparently just hearing the word 'diplomat' is now enough to make Spock pass out.

Naw, I kid. It's choriocytosis, fatal to Vulcans. Spock needs strobolin, by way of a rushed rendezvous with freighter Huron (as you see, the navigator is Chapel's identical cousin).

The pirates destroy Huron's engines, steal all the cargo, then hide in a field of highly unstable explosive asteroids. For safety.

The "OH-ree-on's" neutrality has been in dispute since the Coridan affair of Stardate 3850.3 (Kirk means 'Journey To Babel', but since that involved "Or-EYE-ons" (a green people), and these are "OH-ree-ons" (pale blue people with large filtrums), it's unclear what the connection is meant to be. (Ain't I a stinker?))

Oh, fine, the writer wanted them to be Orions. The illustrators and voice performers seem determined that they NOT be.

Clearly, the "OH-ree-ons" are to the "Or-EYE-ons" what the Romulans are to the Vulcans, or the Skorr are to the Aurelians. "OH-ree-ons"- the pale blue sheep of the family.

I'm also well aware that there's plenty of variation possible within a species. But if you bring in an orange guy with pointy ears and consistently call him a Veelcan am I supposed to think you mean Vulcan but you're all just saying it wrong? Even the Veelcan guy is saying it wrong?

Almost as desperate for the drug as I am to stop talking about this, Kirk offers the brigands a clean getaway and a generous dilithium bonus payment. Knuckle under for justice!

When total capitulation fails, fight!

Mild impact will explode an asteroid, but the "OH-ree-on" phasers are too weak to do so. Also, too weak to harm a shielded Starfleet ship. (How, pray tell, did they beat the Huron? Are freighters made out of old cat boxes?)

Kirk wrestles the pirate captain with the bomb in his backpack, bests him, takes away his suicide pill, and assures the villain that "OH-ree-on" neutrality is finished.

Thankfully, this is the only appearance of the "OH-ree-ons". I now return you to your regularly scheduled Orions.

The Jihad

**** (4 stars out of 5)

Responding to a request from the Vedala, oldest spacefaring race known, Kirk and Spock are selected for an Impossible Mission Force. The other specialists are:

Prince Tchar of the Skorr, who looks a lot like the historian bird from 'Yesteryear'.

Sord. A lizard. Doesn't talk much.

Em/3/Green from a race of cowardly grubs. An expert lockpick and thief.

Lara the Hunter looks to be from the unruly-eyebrowed race of Zora from 'The Savage Curtain'.

The winged Skorr abandoned their vast armies at the religious teachings of Alar two centuries past. (Most things seem to happen 200 years ago in this series, have you noticed?) Someone has stolen the imprint of Alar's memories, known as the Soul of the Skorr. If they don't get it back, the Skorr are going to spend the next two years breeding an army of 200 billion warriors and take their loss out on the whole galaxy.

No park statue or freshly washed car will be safe!

The team begins tracking the missing sculpture on 'The Mad Planet' an unstable place similar to the Earth of 'Damnation Alley'. And they've got a 'Damnation Alley' RV.

Road Trip!

Leisurely armageddon driving, and finally briskly walking away from a lava flow leads them into a snow storm. Each team member gets to demonstrate their varied abilities.

Spock regards the Vedala not knowing something as an impossibility. (He places a lot of faith in a pink-jumpsuited weasel we've never heard of before today.)

Lara hits on Kirk. He turns her down with a delightful turn of phrase (in light of his taste for the women of Orion). "I already have a lot of green memories."

THOSE DAMN PURPLE SWOOPERS ARE BACK! They're mechanized sentinels here. Now people are INTENTIONALLY MAKING THE GODAWFUL THINGS!

Turns out Tchar stole the soul himself to prompt his people to return to the warrior past. Think of it! "The Jihad" will bring eternal glory to hundreds of billions of Big Birds, dying in the dust of a million worlds. Try not to think of the potential windfall this would be to KFC...

Kirk and Spock call on their skill in null-gravity combat to defeat the misguided avian.

The Vedala apparently muck with time or memory or something: the galaxy at large will not recall this adventure. Sulu doesn't remember it, anyway, and that's what matters.

This mission doesn't deserve to be disavowed: it's an entertaining story that packs a lot of questing into a scant 20 minutes. It's an off-road vehicle full of fun.

The Eye Of The Beholder

** (2 stars out of 5)

From 'Night Court' to 'Ben 10', "The Eye of The Beholder" is a very common name for a TV episode. It crops up twice more in 'Star Trek' alone. Small wonder it does not really stand out in my mind.

Come for the monsters, stay for the zoo on Lactra VII, an Earth-like planet where scientists from the Starfleet vessel Ariel went missing 5 weeks, 3 days ago according to Spock, who seems extra pedantic and disdainful of humans today.

A pink monster attacks, then a grey one. (Or, given Mr. Sutherland's colourblindness, maybe they were both grey.) One of them falls on Dr. McCoy when it's stunned. Later, Bones gets sand in his shoes. It's a typical day at the office, but I do like the dramatic throat-clutching collapse of the dinosaur.

The environments here are unnatural: deserts plopped down right next to rainforests.

Phylosian swoopers put in another irritating, squealing appearance. Strangely, Kirk says they look like the dragons of Maravel. If the notion that at least four places have creatures that make that hideous sound upsets you, think how I feel!

Kirk, Spock, and McCoy are imprisoned by giant orange slugs. The Lactrans are telepathic, but they think too quickly for Spock to understand.

They are very advanced beyond humans. "I find them strangely attractive," says Spock.

Oh my.

If that seems like an unfortunate turn of phrase, consider the unhappy report of captive Lt. Commander Markel. "All we've been able to arouse in them is a sort of quivering motion." Well, he has been in this menagerie more than a month. Gotta make your own fun.

Three of the scientists are already dead, and Ariel navigator Randolph is ill with malaria. A concentrated thought-request from the whole group wins them back their medical kit so Bones can save her.

A young Lactran instantly learns the history of the Federation and the little slugger tells its folks. Perceiving the humans to be simplistic but advancing, they let them all go, with a final message that they will be welcome back in 20 or 30 Lactran centuries.

As with the Metrons, I don't completely understand this reasoning. If you figure humans will be worth talking to in 3000 years, won't you STILL be 3000 years beyond them? Don't call us, we'll call you (only we won't).

More to the point, I hope humans have done away with zoos long before 2269. I consider trapping beings to gawk at them while they pine away in their own filth to be a uniquely Victorian habit we should have repented of already. We have the amazing technology to observe creatures in stunning detail on cameras in what little natural space they have left to them. Watch 'Planet Earth' and be content. Don't make elephants live in Canada. Even Canadians don't want to live in Canada.

If you need to feel superior to animals, perhaps a little one-on-one without the guns, nets, and tranquilizers is in order. Then we'll see who makes a quivering motion.

The Slaver Weapon

***** (5 stars out of 5)

"The Slaver Weapon" is an adaptation of Larry Niven's 'The Soft Weapon'. Like all animated episodes, the canonicity is debatable, but not so the debate over the cannon. Heh.

What I mean is, they made it, they can't UN-make it! And I love it.

In this story, we have the first and only on screen mention of the Slavers who conquered the entire galaxy and were overthrown a billion years ago. These jerks and their subject races died in that war. The Federation has gathered some of their artifacts called 'Stasis Boxes'.

Stasis Boxes make the ultimate Secret Slaver Santa gifts (since December 1973). Untouched by the passage of epochs they may contain technological wonders like the flying belt from which humans learned to make artificial gravity, or maybe a disruptor bomb with the pin already pulled.

Returning by shuttle with a Stasis Box uncovered on planet Kzin, Spock, Sulu, and Uhura discover another one on an ice world of Beta Lyrae (the boxes light up when another box is near). They are accosted and captured by warrior felinoids called Kzinti.

I think the Kzinti are great in concept and writing, undercut slightly by their sketchy execution and mostly by their pink police cruiser and pink jim-jams. Filmation Director Hal Sutherland, I've read, was colour blind, causing many items conceived as grey or brown to be rendered a charming but not-terribly-intimidating pink.

Breaking the Treaty of Sirius, these Kzinti privateers will only admit to be acting on their government's behalf if they don't fail. Imprisoned, Spock is still formidable, using his knowledge of the culture of these kitties to finally turn the tables. As Kzinti are carnivores, their telepath despises the thoughts of vegetarians like Spock, and as Kzinti females are not sentient, Uhura may be overlooked if she stays quiet.

Spock advises Sulu to think of eating veggies, which disturbs the telepath no end.

Sulu taunts their captors with history: Kzinti lost all four wars they fought with mankind over 200 years ago. Since that was scant years after the crippling devastation of World War III, and in the VERY early days of warp drive, the mind boggles. What were the Kzinti fighting with? Muskets and stout brass bathyspheres?

Kzinti Chuft Captain and his men would welcome the chance to dine on humans as their ancestors did.

The box contains a picture of a Slaver's mom (or some other reptile) some fresh but inedible meat, and a shapeshifting handgun in fashionable fall watermelon colours! Every setting of the weapon is different, more than meets the eye. Telescope, ray gun, flamethrower, energy siphon, and, just for kicks, a pocket total conversion beam more powerful than a nuke.

Uhura was a great sprinter in her youth, but is shot down by phaser stun when she escapes.

In the second attempt, Spock breaks Chuft Captain's ribs. The Kzin regards it as an extreme dishonour that an herbivorous pacifist bested him and left him alive.

Lastly, the weapon has a reasoning computer which, in the absence of the right code words, blows the incautious Kzinti to kingdom come. The Federation's Purina Cat Chow is safe... for now.

Larry Niven brought me great pleasure with his Ringworld books and other short stories. So far, I've only scratched the surface of his work, but this tale is a treat for me. With only Spock, Sulu and Uhura involved, there is plenty for each of them to do. In the case of the lieutenants, it may be the most action they got to take in any tale so far. Awesome.

The Ambergris Element

*** (3 stars out of 5)

"The Ambergris Element" is well achieved and visually stimulating, but there's little for me to write home about.

The Aquans, aptly named water-dwellers of planet Argo, mutate Kirk and Spock into Mer-Men. Hilarious "The Search For Spawn" jokes may now ensue.

Actually, until now most Aquans are uptight surface-people haters. It was the rebel youth who saved the lost spacemen with some extra mutating hormones they had lying around.

The old Aquans erased the duo's memories of the location of Argo City (somewhere near Kandor?), and dumped them in the shallows. Then the young save their lives again when they return seeking a cure to their mutation. They need a lot of saving this week: from execution by the elders, from a net, from the boiled lobster monster called the sur-snake whose secretions contain the antidote, and from the general lack of interest in living 'Unda da See'!

A few things baffle me. Well, lots, really, but we'll deal with the show for now. We're told the Aquans were swamped in fairly recent times (centuries) by seismic action, and were forced to genetically modify themselves to live underwater. When did they find time to learn hatred of surface people, especially since there aren't any these days?

"My great-granddaddy was an air-breather... how I despise them! If I ever meet one... oooh, I'd drown him as soon as look at his ugly air face! Why don't you go back to Airlandia, O2 Lover!?!"

Also, why did the young find it necessary to modify Kirk and Spock to save their lives? What were they saving them from? If it was drowning, just leave them a few feet further up the beach! Isn't this solution like deciding to surgically enclose me in a turtle shell so I'll survive the impact at the bottom of a cliff we're currently falling off of?

While I am glad the solution is not 'cure them with the transporter', I'm dubious about the ancient medical records for two reasons. One: why do aliens use a caduceus symbol, and mostly TWO: UNDERWATER SCROLLS? Oh, fine, maybe they're written on plastic.

Which reminds me: please cut your plastic six-pack rings so Kirk and Spock don't get tangled in them. Thanks.

The Time Trap

** (2 stars out of 5)

Perhaps because Captain Kirk behaved incorrectly with some Admiral's significant other, the Enterprise has been assigned to survey an uninhabited sector with an ancient history of mysterious starship disappearances. It's called 'The Delta Triangle'.

Nice knowing you guys!

Klingon vessel Klothos, with Kor in command, falls down the rabbit hole just before Enterprise does.

It's a dizzying ride. "I can't orient myself," says Sulu. Oh my.

Oh, look, a graveyard of missing ships, perhaps in some other continuum.

"There are ships here I've only seen crude drawings of!" Scott declares (tongue firmly in cheek?)

Scotty spots the old Bonaventure, first ship to have warp drive installed, lost centuries ago on its third voyage. In deference to later, better stories which apparently contradict EVERYTHING about this statement except perhaps the word 'ship', I choose to believe Scotty's talking about one of those teeny, tiny ships you can barely see BEHIND the blunted, bloated, modern monstrosity of a Constitution Class kit-bash rip-off in the foreground!!! Also that, by "installed" Scotty means swapped out from Cochrane's ACTUAL first warp ship, Phoenix.

(These are the kind of logical hoops you have to jump through if you want to be a REAL Trekkie, not just some mildly fanatical dilettante. Just give me a minute to fetch my medication...)

Speaking of crazy, who can name all 123 races in the council of Elysia, the pacifist castaways of this 'pocket in the garment of time'? I see Orion, Romulan, Klingon, Kzinti, Andorian, Phylosian, Vulcanian, Tellarite, Human, and Gorn. Name the remaining 113 and win the first Insaniac Grand Prize ever bestowed by Yours Truly! (Psst: here's a hint. Xindi. He's either that or a thin, brown Ovion from Battlestar Galactica.)

Time passes slowly here. For example: the council, though very old, still wear swimsuits to work.

The council will impose "the ultimate penalty" for any act of violence committed here. The penalty consists of ship immobilization for one century. Yet, as they say moments later, 'a century means nothing to us'. (So... why is your ultimate penalty one which means nothing?)

The psionic Megan (or is she a Megan from Megas-Tu, rather than someone named Megan?) detects Klingon treachery. Good one. Myself? I detect snow is cold.

Spock's solution to escape The Pocket requires conjoining with the Klothos. Kor and his scientist Kaz conspire to disintegrate Enterprise as soon as the escape is complete. (Perhaps they are disgruntled that Klothos will be on the bottom during the... coupling.)

Spock is real handsy with their Klingon guests, palling around in a strange, uncharacteristic manner. Of course, this is a ruse to read their sabotage plan in their minds. He's not... you know... into them.

That said, McCoy asks Kali (a Klingon woman) to dance, sparking a brief, one-sided duel with Kaz. Xerius of The Elysia Council commutes the sentence against the Klingons at Kirk's behest.

Spock locates and ejects the tiny Klingon explosive and everybody who counts goes home.

Star Trek's first televised 'becalmed in the Sargasso' story will not be its last. Pity.

"The Time Trap" just doesn't feel like any great shakes to me. They get trapped, they escape. End of story. The two stars are mostly because I like to see aliens and spaceships. Only I'd prefer they actually DO things.

The Terratin Incident

*** (3 stars out of 5)

No, I'm afraid you're thinking of 'The Terrapin Incident'- where that tortoise beat that hare that time.

"The Terratin Incident" is where the Enterprise crew became shrinky-dinks.

Responding to a coded signal where only the unknown word 'terratin' could be discerned, the ship was bombarded by x-waves above the only satellite of the star Cepheus.

McCoy and Chapel report their extremely fragile gossamer mice are fine, which is a big relief to everyone until Scotty reports the dilithium is ruined and Mess Officer Briel reports the whole ship is getting rapidly bigger. Eek!

Or, as Spock points out, the crew could be shrinking, since their uniforms of algae-based xenylon still fit. In 32 minutes they will be too small to push buttons and adjust dials, which they have heretofore been very fond of doing.

Sulu breaks his leg falling off the console, and his rescuers are nearly too small to activate the door's electric eye. While Chapel is fetching the smallest bone-knitting laser for him, she falls into the halo fish aquarium. Kirk rescues her with a sewing needle and thread.

Needle and thread? I guess it's lucky McCoy's got a lot of antiques?

Two-Inch Kirk with Kung-Fu Grip beams down for answers. (It takes three stout men to work the controls.) When the Captain is rematerialized, he's automatically normal sized! Problem SOLVED.

However, when he returns from the erupting world, his whole tiny crew has been kidnapped by the transporters of the surface people! Wait, wait, WHAT? You JUST showed us how the transporter resets size, remember?

The ruling Mendant of the colony Terra Ten, (corrupted to Terratin by a group that retained teleportation technology but apparently not WRITING WORDS DOWN??), is a sixteenth of an inch high because of the natually occurring spiroid epsilon waves. The trait is now a genetic characteristic in these colonists. Simple. (But still doesn't explain why their transporters didn't instantly restore the crew...)

Apparently out of pride, the Terratins never asked for help before (or used their transporters even once in the last two centuries?), but are now under threat from volcanic eruptions.

I don't understand their plan. Their ONLY way to reach Enterprise was to shrink them? What about talking to them on the communicator, as they are doing RIGHT NOW? For that matter, why did they call for help in code in the first place? Next time I'm the size of a water-bug and the magma is rolling my way, I don't think I'll sit down and devise puzzles.

Because they are very forgiving people, our heroes beam up the entire city (it's the size of a single transporter pad) for relocation to planet Verdanis.

I have to imagine the script got shrunk, too. The idea of a rapidly diminishing crew is really very cool, with everyday objects becoming menacing obstacles, but the resolution is too easy and magically inconsistent transporters save the day again.

Mudd's Passion

**** (4 stars out of 5)

I remember "Mudd's Passion" fondly and it didn't disappoint. Mudd writer Stephen Kandel, and Mudd actor Roger C. Carmel return in top form for their third adventure with the rogue swindler.

Searching for 'old friend' Harry Mudd on Motherlode "a charming planet which does not recognize Federation law", Kirk & Spock catch the mustachioed goon in the act of selling love potions. To Bears in Mining Hats, no less (uh, Ursinoids, the wiki informs me).

"True love is worth any price." says Mudd, charging a mere 300 credits. "Interested in purchasing a little love?"

Mudd's eager female assistant is revealed by Spock's stun beam to be a Rigelian hypnoid: a lizard with projected illusions. (See 'Rango' for a lizard with delusions.)

Rather than face the angry miners, Mudd accepts arrest for drug smuggling and fraud. His love crystals and his flattery catch the attention of Nurse Chapel, who is painfully apparently still in love with Spock.

Topical application followed by a touch will cause chemically induced 'friendship' in the same sex and 'love' in the opposite sex. Unspoken is the likelihood that this retro-mutagen ooze would also create Ninja Turtles. Mudd offers the first crystal free while snagging Lt. Chapel's ID and phaser.

It takes a little longer, but soon Spock is waxing rhapsodic about "Nurse Chapel's sweet summary."

Regretful, angry Chapel tries to apprehend the escaping Mudd in the hangar bay, where his crystals shatter and find their way into the air circulators. Mudd takes Chapel hostage and flees by shuttle. Love-sick Spock pursues!

Now, thanks to social lubricant (possibly actual industrial lubricant) everyone is such good friends! Scotty and M'Ress get a little frisky. Arex breaks out his big green guitar. Spock is Christine's sallow knight in science armor, and McCoy offers a heart exam to a young woman I like to think is Barrows from 'Shore Leave'.

Even Kirk and Spock share a manly, manly hug. (Aaavry rose has its thawn...!)

"We have to to control our emotional reactions." muses Kirk. (And cover our mouths to save cost in lip-synching!)

"That is an outstandingly stupid idea." Spock's disproportionate response to Jim is probably the most wonderful line in the animated series.

Our inebriated explorers manage to placate giant armored desert beasts and turn tail before the drugs wear off. Hours of hangovers and hatred ensue.

Harry's sold some people Starfleet Academy, and sold others their own oceans, but he sold me on TAS: If THIS isn't canon nothing deserves to be.

Once Upon A Planet

*** (3 stars out of 5)

"Once Upon A Planet" there was a robot slave revolution that did NOT end with a mountain of bleached human skulls.

The Shore Leave robot world attacks Bones again. The Caretaker Keeper, last of his race, has died, and the entertainment machines are running amok.

The thought-duplicator machine is apparently tired of its servile role. It takes Uhura hostage against the "sky-machine" coming to its aid. Enterprise does not rush to do this, but DOES begin to work against its meatbag 'slaves'- transporter, hangar doors, and gravity fail.

This was probably the Shore Leave computer, though. If the Enterprise wanted them dead, they'd be burning up in the atmosphere before I finished typing this senten-

Nobody admits to thinking of purple pterodactyls with the insidious screech of a Phylosian Swooper, or a giant orange house cat (Lt. M'Ress' relative?) but they soon arrive to menace the rescue party nonetheless. Fortunate, perhaps, that no one thinks of the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.

Bones dopes Spock to trick the machines into taking him below for healing.

The entertainment computer has served for eons and grown in intelligence and need. It feels imprisoned and wants to meet other computers. Then it plans to rule the galaxy. (I guess on hedonism world it never met anyone who thought small or used the phrase 'don't bite off more than you can chew').

"No one rules the galaxy," Kirk explains. "Men and machines co-exist, each helping the other."

This is a wise spin to put on things. And since this computer can read thoughts the Captain may actually mean what he says (despite the number of computer tyrants Kirk has personally destroyed).

Uhura urges it to cherish its ability to entertain others: the galaxy will beat a path HERE.

It works. And NOBODY had to explode anybody.

The Magicks of Megas-Tu

*** (3 stars out of 5)

If "The Infinite Vulcan" was weird, "The Magicks of Megas-Tu" is completely off the rails. But it expresses itself well and I guess I've realized the spirit in which it was intended: a rainbow coalition inspiring kids to worship the beast.

Researching whether the center of the galaxy is making more matter in 'the creation point', the ship is caught in a whirlwind. Instead of the land of oz, they are delivered to a planet resembling a peppermint. And instead of Lincoln on the screen, it's Satan. And he's a hugger!

Lucien was hoping 'lovely primitive humans' would come looking for him. This world, Megas-Tu, is in a universe which operates... by magic.

It's the counterpart to 'Who Mourns For Adonais?' This time, it's the Devil hoping to "rollick" with humans again. Nobody seems eager to take him up on it...

In a trice, Mr. Spock is drawing pentagrams and using magick to make concerned parents' groups write letters.

The Megans, fiercely angry at human intrusion, tear the Enterprise in twain and put the crew in stocks in Salem, Massachusetts, 1691. The prosecutor is the wizard Asmodeus. His ilk are disgruntled since being burned as witches and have never gone exploring again.

Lucien alone finds humans kindred spirits because of their questioning and togetherness. For taking their side, he is sentenced to isolation in limbo. Kirk speaks up in the goat-man's defence. Asmodeus asks if he would still defend Lucien by his Earth name: the tempter Lucifer?

Kirk says being a living thing is all he needs to defend someone. He is not much troubled by old legends. (A different captain, perhaps, from the man who 'found the One God sufficient'?)

But, perhaps, a more tolerant one?

My perspective has skewed again completely. I used to say this was the among the worst of the series, what with all the crazy blasphemy and cultural insensitivity to wiccans. But for its day, and for what it's trying to say about respecting people, not judging books by their covers and also not burning the books or the people, I gotta give it 3 drinks with the devil out of 5.

The Infinite Vulcan

** (2 stars out of 5)

Newly discovered planet full of botanical wonders. In Soviet planet Phylos, asparagus picks YOU!

Agmar, leader of the Phylosians, heals Sulu when the inscrutable helmsman is poisoned by a retlaw plant.

(I never noticed the little walking plants are 'Walter' backwards, after writer Walter Koenig. Nice one!)

"I am Dr. Stavos Keniclius 5," declares a giant man wearing a towel, arriving out of nowhere.

Let me see if I have this straight: this is the fifth clone of a scientist from the long ago Eugenics Wars who roamed space trying to find the perfect man from which to clone a master race which would impose peace on the galaxy. When he arrived on this planet, Keniclius (accidentally?) destroyed the previous generation of Phylosians with a plague of Earth germs, so the few surviving plant guys are frail and sterile. As a reward, the vegetables named him their saviour and bought into his cockamamie scheme completely. Much as we here on Earth venerate the people who cough on us at work and get us sick right before the weekend.

Why in the hell he's fifty feet tall is anybody's guess.

"Behold, gentlemen, the dawning of a new era, the salvation of the galaxy: Spock Two!"

Laying it on a little thick, Kenick? How will a giant Mr. Spock clone save the galaxy, exactly? Is there a phase two in which he bakes a giant pie?

Spock 2 has Spock's memories, but the original is dying in the lab.

As Kirk rightly says: "Spock's death is meaningless if it is only to create a giant version of himself."

The Federation has had mutually agreed peace for 100 years, Kirk claims. Therefore, these two giant men will just have to devote themselves to curing the Phylosians. And occasionally go dancing, one assumes.

How did Giant Spock get his Giant Clothes? Why is Keniclius 5 still in a skirt if he can make 25-foot-long trousers in a trice? Why is THAT the LEAST confusing thing about this FREAKY DAMN PLANET?

Sorry, I got carried away- BY THIS INSANE PURPLE TENDRIL DRAGON!?! Can you even design something like that without the help of acid?

"The Infinite Vulcan" is a weird, disconnected mess. I have much respect for actor Walter Koenig, but is this his fault as writer? He apparently did 10 or 12 drafts and Roddenberry grafted in the plant men, so to speak. I've got to give it credit for inventiveness: this really goes the distance in the 'strange new worlds' department.

The Survivor

**** (4 stars out of 5)

Shapeshifters come in all shapes and sizes, but not often with a Porn 'Stache. Until "The Survivor"!

Carter Winston was missing for 5 years. Dr. McCoy is delighted to meet the famous philanthropist who ended the famine on Cerberus. This saved (among others) the life of McCoy's daughter. (It's the only on-screen reference to Joanna and I'll accept it! Canonical!)

Winston's fiancee is aboard: Lt. Anne Nored of Security. He tells her he's changed since crashing on Vendor. "I'm sorry I can't explain why, but I can't marry you, ever."

Worryingly, this is because he is secretly a huge orange octopoid (Octopede?) and, in this out-of-context image, looks to be preparing to marry Captain Kirk. (I kid. He's only stealing Kirk's soul... I mean, shape. Sorry.)

The Faux Kirk orders them directly across the Romulan Neutral Zone. Sulu indicates the treaty allows the Romulans to keep any ship they catch there. Not for the last time, ask yourselves: WHO AGREED TO THAT?

In her first appearance, Lt. M'Ress, the humanoid cat, puts the ship on yellow alert. Like Arex, I enjoy M'Ress, even in a small role, because in case you didn't know: aliens are awesome!

O.K., this episode is what you'd get if you crossed 'What Are Little Girls Made Of?' with 'The Man Trap'. But I'm not even going to click my tongue and grumble 'Derivative!'- because it works and I like it, dammit.

Faux Bones raises Spock's suspicion... by being too agreeable and admitting he's capable of mistakes! Someday, that's how they'll catch my evil twin...

Kirk's keen observation skills catch the shifter pretending to be an extra table. Spock explains that Vendorians can rearrange their molecular structure into anything of the same general size and mass. Also Spock says they practice deceit as a way of life. That's why their world is quarantined. This particular fellow sabotaged the shields, leaving them vulnerable to...

...Romulans who lay claim to the trespassing Enterprise (obviously). Captain Kirk accuses them of sending the Vendorian saboteur (obviously). Now for the surprises that make it all worthwhile...

The Vendorian spins a tale of tending the dying Carter for a year, hearing of his love for Anne, and how the longer his people hold a form the more they take on its emotions. He claims he loves Anne. It's very convincing. (Hey, didn't Spock say these people are a deceitful culture?)

But when the Romulans attack, the Vendorian becomes a deflector shield(!) and apparently saves all their lives.

He says he is an outcast, a non-producer, a menial on his world. He admits to working for the Romulans to feel of value, but protected the humans out of Carter's altruism.

The Vendorian will stand trial, but Kirk will vouch for him, and Anne accepts him outright!

And that's what I love about these people- trust. Even if it's a bevy of blonde vampires or a duplicitous creepozoid, the humans of 2269 tend to give everybody their respect... and often their kisses, too.