Comic Review: Transformers VS G.I. Joe

    Full disclosure, here.  As a wee lad, G.I. Joe, was my jam.  I had the toys, I watched the cartoon, I listened to the audio-stories, I had the bed sheets; you name it.  It was even the book that I delved into during my first, short-lived attempt at following comics.  My fandom did not continue into adulthood, but I have fond memories, none the less.  However, I never thought too much of Transformers.  I watched the cartoon, and I guess I enjoyed it (more than Voltron or He-Man and some of the others popular at the time).  But I wasn’t in to the toys, I never contemplated putting an Autobots sticker on my car, and I flippin’ hate the new movies (I kinda like the second live-action G.I. Joe film).  I won’t swear to it, but I think the only Transformers thing I ever read was a G.I. Joe VS Transformers comic set during World War II, from the early 2000s.  I liked it, but it didn’t make me seek out more.

    So, I had little interest in another crossover between these franchises.  But, I’m a big fan of Tom Scioli and his mad bastard Jack Kirby-like insanity.  When I heard he was working on the project, I knew I’d have to give it a look, even if it otherwise didn’t interest me.  Scioli’s that good.  Free Comic Book Day came along, and there was a preview issue.  I took it home and may have even read it that night.  Holy crap!  Reading it was like plucking childhood memories right out of my head.  It had the weird little kid logic I used to employ when playing.  The same vaguely sick sense of wonder and horror that produced things like building huge structures, peppered with action figures, then knocking them down to see how all the bodies end up.  The dialog, the plotline, the crazy ideas; Scioli and co-author John Barber are tapped into something.  This is everything my weird little brain would have wanted the cartoon to be, everything it was when I was alone.

    You can’t talk about a Scioli project and not talk about the art.  With hyper-weird images sifted through Golden Age comic mentality, his work explodes with energy.  And with his odd, slightly off, almost muted colors, reading the book sometimes feels like reading the backs of packages, or those full page ads you’d find in comic books from the 80s.  Scioli’s work calls out for color, and it gets a ton here.

    If you were a kid in the 80s, if you played with G.I. Joes or Transformers, if you’re in to weird comics, and if you like the idea of something way, way out there being dressed in a mainstream, commercial skin, read Transformers VS G.I. Joe.  It’s the kind of thing I love, the kind of book I sit back and wonder, ‘how the hell did this get greenlit?’

Transformers VS G.I. Joe
Authors: Tom Scioli & John Barber
Artist: Tom Scioli
Publisher: IDW
ISBN: 978-1-63140-190-9

-Matthew J. Constantine

The Passing of Leonard Nimoy

Though not surprised (he had been experiencing serious health issues for some time), I was still saddened to hear of the passing of Leonard Nimoy today, at the age of 83.  Watching Star Trek is among my earliest and fondest of memories.  The morality of the show was key to my development as a human, and Nimoy will always be a part of that.  He will be missed.  

-Matt

Book Review: Fringe: The Burning Man

    A few months ago, I reviewed the first of Christa Faust’s Fringe tie-in novels, The Zodiac Paradox.  Walter Bishop was my favorite character on the show, and I enjoyed the heck out of all the Walter and William Bell stuff, but was admittedly not engaged in the overall plot about the Zodiac killer.  However, I enjoy Faust’s writing enough to keep me reading and enjoying myself.  I knew going in that this second book focused on Olivia, who I can’t say was ever a character I found especially interesting.  Still.  Faust?  I’m there.

    Early in the book, I was getting a bit nervous.  The nitty-gritty writing was, typical of Faust, quite good.  But the story seemed to be going down a similar path to the first book.  A character from the show, a killer, a psychic bond… Uh oh.  Media tie-in novels are always tough.  There are certain rules you’ve got to stay within while writing, certain ideas of a universe you need to hold onto, and often, an unwillingness on the part of the people with the purse strings to stray too far from what is established.  Was this second book going to follow a formula that would be the basis of all the Fringe novels?  That would be sad.  But thankfully, no.  My faith was restored when the plot took a pretty darned surprising turn about two thirds of the way in, and the focus of the book shifted rather wildly.  Excellent.  I won’t go into details, but the last third or so of the book gets into some very Fringe-worthy world building, and hints at some really nasty stuff.

    If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you’ve heard it before.  I’ll pick up anything Christa Faust writes.  She and Philip Reeve are the two authors I don’t take any time to think about.  I just get it, and read it.  Like listening to James Earl Jones read the phonebook, I don’t so much care what she’s writing about, I just really like the way she does it.  But getting past that, I am impressed by how well she’s able to capture the voices of established characters.  That’s probably the single greatest challenge of making media tie-in novels work for fans, and she’s got it down pat.  Even though most of this book deals with Olivia as a teenager, you can see the Olivia of the TV show in proto-form.  And she makes for a good, smart, tough character, with a much more proactive approach to life and its problems.

    I have to admit, I am darned surprised that I ended up enjoying this Olivia focused book more than the Walter one.  But the plot pivot kicked me in the expectations, and that’s something I intensely enjoy.  If you’re a fan of the show these books are worth checking out.  Or if you just enjoy brisk, compulsively readable books.  And now I’m looking forward to Sins of the Father.  Back to a Bishop.  I don’t know what the future plans for these books are.  Will there be more?  Will Christa Faust still be on them?  I know I’d love to read more about Walter Bishop and his adventures in mad science.  It feels like so much of his life is unexplored.  Time will tell.  In the meantime, go out and get a copy (and while you're out, grab Faust's Money Shot and Choke Hold!).

Fringe: The Burning Man
Author: Christa Faust
Publisher: Titan Books
ISBN: 978-1781163115

-Matt

Movie Review: The Cage/Where No Man Has Gone Before

    This time around I’m going to do something a little different.  Instead of the feature films I normally review, I’m going into some detail on the two pilots for the original Star Trek TV series.  I think it’ll serve as a good transition between Forbidden Planet and my next selection.

    The original pilot for Star Trek was noticeably different from the show that was to come.  In fact, the only character you might recognize is Mr. Spock, though even he isn’t the emotionally dead alien we all know and love.  It takes many cues from previous science fiction, mostly books.  But you can’t help but notice similarities, especially in design, to the groundbreaking Forbidden Planet.  It didn’t exactly go over well with the powers that were, but apparently it had something, because they commissioned a second pilot and eventually the show that would become so popular.  The Cage fell into obscurity, only a few parts seen in flashbacks during a two part episode of the regular show.  It didn’t see broadcast until sometime in the 80s.  Like the original pilot of Lost in Space, there are a lot of ‘what might have been’ moments in The Cage.  The most striking things, of course, is Jeffery Hunter as Captain Christopher Pike.  Though I don’t know that network television of the time could have dealt with sustaining a character like Pike in any meaningful way.  But I like this captain who is at the end of his rope, ready to quit.  He’s seen too much, done too much, lost too many people.  Kirk, for all his cool, was really a typical action TV hero of the time.  I like Pike’s bitterness.

    The storyline again echoes Forbidden Planet at the beginning, with the crew investigating a lost ship.  There’s even stuff about a long lost super advanced civilization (their hallways are even the same shape as the Krell).  But things take a different road once those aliens, iconic 50s/60s style giant headed aliens in sparkling robes.  With Pike captured and the crew left to figure things out, we go into an exploration of what it means to be a Human, to be a free and independent being.  There’s a lot of stuff about illusion and memory, and what those things mean to us.  Apparently the executives who saw this originally thought that it was ‘too cerebral.’  Too cerebral?  I guess in the world of I Love Lucy and The Honeymooners, maybe it was.  For science fiction, like film and TV has pretty much always been, it was 20 to 30 years behind the literary times.  It had a woman serving as First Officer (execs couldn’t live with that), something that wouldn’t have been too shocking for any sci-fi reader of the day.  It had an alien working on the ship, another thing that wouldn’t have been too strange for readers, but didn’t sit too well with the suits.  I’d have preferred they keep the lady and the alien, but they had to pick their battles.  The resolution of the story is a bit too quick, too easy.  A bit of a deus ex machina with the sudden translation of the ship’s computer followed by a ‘woops, our bad’ on the part of the aliens.  Yet it still manages to pull out a bittersweet element with the blonde and her fate.

    With the second commissioned Star Trek pilot, Where No Man Has Gone Before, we meet the new, more dashing captain of the enterprise, James (here R.) Kirk.  Also, the first appearances of Scotty and Sulu.  And Spock is more like what he would become, uncomfortable with Kirk’s ‘Earth emotions.’  We see much more of the ship’s interior in the episode, and a taste of the interesting lighting and color pallet that would be a hallmark of the show.  The story features another lost ship, this one swept beyond a weird energy barrier at the edge of the galaxy.  There’s some stuff about people with ESP (popular at that time) who are effected by the strange energy.  After the Enterprise goes through the barrier, it too is effected, or at least, some of its crew are.  Many die, but one, Kirk’s old school chum Garry Mitchell, gets a major league brain boost.  How does one deal with a man who may be becoming a god?  How does a man deal with that transformation in himself?

    Though I really love this episode, it does feature a movie/TV science fiction cliché that drives me a bit nuts.  In movies and TV, any superior machine or person is automatically amoral (rare) or evil (frequent).  Though the literature features robots and super-beings with good intentions, film and TV seems totally void of even the potential of benevolence among superiors.  I don’t see why superior intellect would not also feature superior morality.  We’re smarter than our ancestors and a hell of a lot more moral, why would our descendants (genetically and cybernetically advanced though they may be) be different?  Now, in the case of Garry Mitchell, one could easily see that he had some deep flaws in his emotional make-up right from the start.  The kind of thing that might never have turned ugly; but when power is thrust into his hands, allows him to be corrupted faster and more completely than normal.  Dr. Dehner, for example, seems like she might have retained her moral center if given the chance.  Mitchell seems like the kind of guy who walks through life without much hassle, not having to work for the things he gets, and resentful of the things that challenge him.  That’s a man made to abuse power.

    Something about the script and pacing of this makes it feel more ‘cinematic’ to me than Trek ever felt until The Motion Picture.  In fact, I thought a modified version of this could have made an interesting feature film.  I’d like to see some of the issues dealt with in a deeper way, especially the reasons for Mitchell’s fall into power-fueled madness.  I guess they addressed the complaint that The Cage was ‘too cerebral’ by having a big fistfight ending.  That kind of set the stage for a recurring theme in the rest of the series.  I had an odd realization while watching this, actor Gary Lockwood is playing a human being uplifted to a super-being that turns evil.  A few years later, he would play the doomed partner of a man who is uplifted to a super-being with the potential for good in 2001;  2001, which features a supercomputer that goes murderously rogue, while also featuring an uplifted human with the potential to save mankind.  Kind of a mixed message, there.

    I don’t think Star Trek has ever quite lived up to the potential represented by these first two pilots, at least not more than a few times.  It’s a great show and has some really good episodes.  But few capture the sweep or emotion of these first two stories.  City on the Edge of Forever (often cited as one of the best, though not my favorite) is probably the closest.  Watching them makes me wish things could have been different, better writing, more structured stories, more planning.  I know TV of that day didn’t work like that, slavishly devoted to the episodic, wrapped up in an hour, watchable in any order way of things.  But science fiction is often about ‘what if?’  So what if these two stories, The Cage and Where No Man Has Gone Before, had been more of an indication of the show to come?  Not the show of silly crap like Charlie X or Catspaw, but a more serious science fiction adventure show.  More Heinlein, Clarke, Asimov, etc.  Less Shadow of the Gun, Omega Glory, and Spock’s Brain.  What if?

-Matt

An Open Letter to CBS, Paramount, et al.

To the Powers That Be behind a possible future Star Trek TV series,

    What is Star Trek?  That’s a question that has a lot of answers, depending on who you ask.  When thinking about a new show, it’s a question that must take center stage.  Is Star Trek just another science fiction show?  Is it something unique?  What have its core values been, and what is its place in our cultural tapestry?  All this and more needs to be asked, thought about, and decided upon before serious steps are taken on any new show.  Obviously, questions of demographic and ratings are there, too.  But doing a good show first should be the rule.  We've seen many times over recent years that a good show, that breaks all the assumed conventions of television, can also grab viewers' attention and become successful (Breaking Bad, Lost, Arrested Development, etc.).

    First, know that times have changed.  The era of episodic television, where everything is wrapped up neatly in 50 minutes, is over.  Shows like Babylon 5, Lost, Battlestar Galactica, Farscape and others show that the viewing audience, especially for science fiction, is more than ready for more complicated characters, evolving plots, long term storytelling, and novelistic approaches to writing.  Take your time, do it right, think it through.  The audience wants to be challenged, wants to question, wants something to discuss at work the next day.  We don't want a show where each plot point can be called to the minute, where the episode always ends on a laugh (T.J. Hooker, Magnum P.I., The A-Team, and with few exceptions, the original Star Trek).

    Second, don’t underestimate your audience.  Science fiction fans are smart, they’re driven, they’re loyal, and they talk.  Discussion boards come alive as viewers pore over the details of each new episode.  Do not discount this.  Do not ignore it.  Don’t let it determine everything you do, but make sure you never forget.  That way, you’ll be more likely to keep things smart, to keep challenging yourselves, and to double check what you do.  Also, don’t skew young (the often rumored Starfleet Academy idea, for example).  Nobody wants to see that.  Producers seem to have this idea stuck in their head that young people like to watch young people.  I don’t know where that comes from, because nobody likes that.  Ask yourselves, who is the most hated character in every science fiction series or movie?  Answer: the kid.  Next Gen - Wesley.  Battlestar - Boxie.  Seaquest - Lucas.  Any character played by Will Smith's kid.  Nobody likes those characters.  Nobody.  So, don’t put ‘em in in the first place.

    Third, don’t forget human nature, even if you’re not writing about humans.  What drives us?  Knowledge, fear, love, hate, sex, etc.  Do not ignore elements of human life.  Characters have sex, they have fun, they have interests outside of work, they have motivations for what they do.  Characters on a show should be as complex as any in a book, with all the background and personality one expects.  That includes not only the protagonists, but the antagonists as well.  Think of the best villains.  Do you love them because they're evil?  Generally, no.  Cobra Commander was evil, but he's hardly one of the best villains.  You love the villains you kind of secretly like, the ones you understand, the ones you can almost imagine yourself becoming.  With motivations and backgrounds that make even the most heinous monsters at least a touch sympathetic, you create far more drama and tension than simply throwing wild eyed, mustache twirling thugs at our hapless heroes.  It's the same with heroes.  You don't want a goodie-goodie, who doesn't have any flaws and always gets it right.  The best heroes are at least a little bit broken.

    Fourth, know your science.  You read it all the time.  This astronaut, or that physicist was inspired as a child by watching Star Trek.  You have a large fanbase in various technical and scientific halls.  So, have the decency to respect them, as you inspire the next generation.  Get scientific advisers and make use of their expertise.  Got an episode about a new lifeform living on the surface of an asteroid?  Talk to a biologist and an astrophysicist, or whoever else you might need to in order to get it right.  And, look to the works of scientists for inspiration.  Stop.  And I do mean stop, with the technobabble.  Say it right, or don't say it at all.  Take a good, long look at where the future may be taking us as a species.  Not only will we be different culturally, and technologically, but might we be different physically, genetically, etc.  And what will that mean?

    The above issues should be considered.  In addition, there are certain setting considerations.  Making the show more complex will allow for expanded storytelling.  There is no need to limit the story to a single crew on a single ship, visiting a planet of the week, facing a monster of the week.  Simultaneous threads could take place on Earth, on a space station, on an exploration vessel reaching new territories, and on a war ship engaged in open conflict.  The galaxy is large, and sweeping stories should be happening, growing and exploring the setting in more than one direction at a time.

    When Star Trek: The Next Generation came out, it was a rather dramatic shift not only in time, but in style.  I would suggest that this be no less so.  In fact, I would suggest it be a much, much more profound shift.  Don’t make the mistake of Voyager, by setting it in a totally unrelated part of space that did nothing to grow the Star Trek universe in any meaningful way.  But don’t make the mistake of both DS9 and Voyage by staying too close to the Next Gen timeline.

    My specific suggestion is to move the timeline forward a significant amount; no less than 100 years; perhaps as much as 1000.  Alter the universe.  Trek is an optimistic setting (or should be), so I would suggest avoiding the tendency to ‘go dark’ that seems so popular.  This doesn’t mean retain some kind of naïve Pollyanna vibe, but don’t try to make this the new Battlestar.  Peace between the Romulans and Federation seems likely, as well as a reconnection with Vulcans.  Klingons would probably become allies once more, perhaps stronger than ever.  Some other groups would probably rise in prominence, becoming more active members of the Federation, which should remain intact, if somewhat altered.  Rebuild the Borg into something menacing and scary, the way they were in their first couple appearances and in First Contact, but most assuredly were not in post-Hugh Next Gen or Voyager.  A cold war type relationship between the two would be likely, with the Borg always trying to break the stalemate.  Advance the technology, too.  Use up to the minute scientific theories to design new ideas and new realms of possibility.  Transhumans, artificial intelligence, Dyson spheres, wormhole transit, massive scale terraforming and world engineering.  All those amazing discoveries the crews of the various Enterprises made (floating cities, sentient robots, ancient technologies, etc.) should actually make a difference, and change the way the Federation does stuff.  And, if it's a Federation of Planets, there should really be a lot more alien representation.  Perhaps more alien design of ships, weirder technology, and generally, more alien presence on ship crews.  While I think a new show should look the the future, I'd also like to see it build a past.  Tell stories that have roots going back into the pre-space histories of Humans, Tholians, Vulcans, whatever. 

    And learn from newer, bolder shows, like Rome, The Shield, or Game of Thrones.  Sometimes less is more.  10 or 12 episodes, carefully crafted and well executed, without needless filler, will be far more effective than 20 to 26 episodes mired with filler and retreads.  And have a plan (with room for alterations, obviously), for 4 to 8 seasons.

    Make Star Trek mean something again.  Take it back to the stars, to the spirit of human advancement in space and culture.  Create the grand dream that will inspire new generations of children to grow up and be astronauts, scientists, philosophers, and artists.  Help us rediscover our love of the unknown.  Help make space seem fun and exciting again.  2009's Star Trek helped bring back the excitement.  Now, help bring back the awe.

            Thank you for your time.
            -Matthew J. Constantine, Star Trek fan since @1979

"This Is War!" Fringe The Final Season Trailer

Here's the trailer for The Final Season of Fringe, my all time favorite science-fiction program.  It's come a long way in it's five seasons.  Seriously, who would have thought it would all culminate in this very Chris Claremonty plotline involving the 1984ish monstrosities, The Observers?  Not me, that's for sure.



--Brad

Book Review: Kolchak: The Night Stalker- The Lost World

    Kolchak: The Night Stalker was a fantastic show.  Two movies and one season of a TV show from the 70s basically paved the way for later shows like The X-Files and Fringe.  The tale of one obnoxious reporter to followed stories wherever they took him, no matter how strange or terrible the eventual outcome, makes for great TV.  When I heard it was being resurrected as a comic series, I was curious, but when I found out it was from ultra-small press, and frequently quality challenged Moonstone, my interest waned.  But, last month, when a small mass market paperback drifted past me at my job, I snapped it right up.  A Kolchak novel?  124 pages?  4.99?  I think I’ve heard of this C.J. Henderson person.  Why not?

    And I got my money’s worth.  It’s a fun, quick read.  Basically an extended episode in book form, without the location shooting restrictions that would have made its Ecuador excursion impossible.  Not a great story, but not bad.  Something about seventy-two chanting people in the jungle.  The writing isn’t too bad.  Captures Kolchak’s slightly burnt, sarcastic reporter vibe.  The ending was a bit anti-climactic, and the characters being moved to L.A. in the modern day didn’t do anything for me.  I’d rather read it as a period novel, embracing the 70s feel of the show.  However, considering how low my expectations were for a media tie-in novel from Moonstone, it wasn’t bad.  And I’d like to see them produce more, maybe better books.  I’d read a Kolchack novel every few months, no prob.

Kolchak: The Night Stalker: The Lost World
Author: C.J. Henderson
Publisher: Moonstone Entertainment Inc.
ISBN: 978-1-936814-16-9
Pages: 124

-Matt

Joan Watson Eats A Hotdog

I don't even know if this is worthy of a post or not, but there it is anyway.  Found this image (over at Bleeding Cool) of Lucy Liu as Dr. Joan Watson eating a hotdog on the set of Elementary, the new New York City based Sherlock Holmes show and it just made me sigh.  I've seen the first three episodes of the BBC version and think it's okay, but it's popularity has spawned this...and I'll check it out and give it the old college try, but Joan Watson?  Really?  How modern...blah.  Makes me feel like just another internet hater.

--Brad

Star Trek Episode Reviews (in production order): Season 2

    All right, the second season of Star Trek, viewed in production order, as opposed to original airing order.  Though there are some fantastic episodes in the second season, it is generally a step down in writing quility.  The cast seems to have a sold handle on their characters and there are clearly times when they were trying out some wild ideas.  And heck, even most not-so-good episodes are still fun to watch.  Here are my reviews for each episode written just after watching them.

Catspaw:  Ugh.  What an inauspicious opening to the second season.  Originally aired just before Halloween, this goofy adventure into cheesy, haunted house antics is simply tiresome.  I expect more from Lovecraft disciple and Psycho writer, Robert Bloch.  Filled with awkward scenes and dumb looking sets it’s just a dog of an episode.  This was also the first episode to feature Chekov and his idiotic wig.  Yikes.

Metamorphosis:  A cool sound stage and solid guest appearance from Glenn Corbett keep this mostly uninteresting episode watchable.  I do like the underlying message about love transcending traditional boundaries, though.  And a common original series idea that I like creeped in, that man needs obstacles in order to grow stronger.

Friday’s Child:  Lots of humor in this episode, in spite of some violent deaths.  The cast gets a good deal of exercise, as Scotty and the ship go off on a side adventure, while Kirk, Spock, and an especially goofy McCoy have fun dealing with savage warriors with strange customs.  Throw a wily Klingon in the mix for some flavor.  Not a great episode, but a fun watch.

Who Morns for Adonis?:  Yikes.  Not a good episode.  Cringe inducing cheeseball acting from guest star Michael Forest as Apollo doesn’t help.  But really, it’s the script here that’s the problem.  Uninspired writing and a story that could have been cool, but isn’t.

Amok Time:  Finally, season two gets good with this classic episode featuring our first serious look into Spock’s past and his people.  Visiting the Vulcan homeworld, Kirk and McCoy witness some crazy antics on the part of the usually stoic Spock, when his blood drives him to mate.  There are some really good bits in this, with some excellent music.  And more than any previous episode, this one cements the trinity of Kirk, Spock, and McCoy.

The Doomsday Machine:  The tension gets cranked up to eleven in this episode about a giant something devouring whole star systems.  Then a cracked commodore gets in on the action.  Some great stuff from Scotty and Spock in this story.   In a way, this episode presages not only The Motion Picture, but the arrival of the Borg much later.

Wolf in the Fold:  Robert Bloch and Star Trek don’t mix.  The third and final episode written by Bloch is only slightly less annoying than Catspaw.  Mr. Scott is a bumbling idiot, ruled by his rampant sexual urges, while a cheesy Agatha Christie wannabe ‘who done it’ ambles on.  Everyone getting high as kites in the last ten minutes makes for some fun comic moments.  But this just isn’t a good episode.

The Changeling:  The major precursor to The Motion Picture, this story has the crew facing off against a shockingly powerful and dangerous probe.  Scotty continues to have bad luck, and something pretty drastic happens to Uhura in the episode that probably should have made more of an impact on the future of the show, except for the nature of episodic TV.  A good episode, overall.

The Apple:  Some of the early exploration in this episode is pretty cool, but once they run into the white beehive hairdo people, it all goes downhill pretty quick.  There isn’t much story, some rampant imperialism on the part of Kirk and crew, and a bunch of uncomfortable sexual innuendo.  And for some reason, Spock keeps getting his butt handed to him (shot with poisonous quills, bounced off an energy field, and struck by lightening!).  Fun in a cheesy sort of way, but not a very good episode.

Mirror, Mirror:  One of the very best episodes, I just love what they do with this one.  From the alternate world versions of our familiar characters, to the crazy costumes, it’s a lot of fun.  And Uhura in that midriff baring outfit…wow.  I always wished they’d returned to this setting with the original cast and crew.  “Your agonizer, please!”

The Deadly Years:  Old age is the enemy in this episode.  Nothing really amazing here, but there are a bunch of cool moments for the actors to put on their best ‘old guy’ routines.  The side story of a competency hearing for Kirk serves more as a distraction than a good plot development.

I, Mudd:  Oh, no.  Mudd returns in this annoying and stupid episode.  I’m never a fan of comic Trek episodes, and this is one of the worst.  Filled with terrible gags, characters acting against character, and well, Mudd, it’s nearly unwatchable.  If ever there were a character that didn’t need to return, it was this annoying jerk.  I hate to think that this episode might be someone’s introduction to the series.  Bah.

The Trouble With Tribbles:  I’m never a big fan of Star Trek’s brief forays into comedy, and this episode is certainly no exception.  Though it often makes it on to people’s favorite lists, I find it more grating than anything else.  The trader character is almost as annoying as Harry Mudd.  There are a few good moments, but overall, not a very good episode.

Bread and Circuses:  Getting past the essential silliness of the parallel Earth concept, this episode about a 20th century Rome is pretty cool.  Gladiators as primetime entertainment.  Escaped slaves forming an underground in the hills outside of a Hollywood equivalent.  There are some good bits.  The cheesy Christian moral shoehorned into the finale is pretty out of place.  But I still like the episode.

Journey to Babel:  The second episode to deal with Spock’s heritage in a major way, here we meet his Vulcan father and human mother.  We get a lot more talk about logic and Vulcan culture.  It’s also a chance for the makeup and costume people to go nuts with all the various alien delegations.  There’s a fun murder plot, and a dramatic medical emergency.  Really, the episode is kind of all over the place, but it’s good.  And Kirk, though he takes something of a back seat in the episode, does have an extra cool tough guy sequence near the end.

A Private Little War:  What a crazy episode.  Klingons, white apes with horns, wacky wigs, sexual healing, Spock slapping, and Vietnam War allegory all wrapped up in one not very good, but goofily fun episode.  No shock this was a Roddenberry penned episode, as it’s extremely heavy handed and jumbled.  Nancy Kovack is especially interesting and weird as the over-ambitious, oversexed witch woman who tries to keep men under her thumb with a potent cocktail of sex and drugs.  Not one of the better episodes, but any means.  But it’s not dull.

Obsession:  Had Star Trek not been an extremely episodic show, and had there been some build up or lead in to this episode, it might have worked better.  Unfortunately, it wasn’t and there wasn’t.  So, Kirk’s completely out of character behavior as well as the young crewman who just happens to be the son of Kirk’s Captain who died under similar circumstances many years ago, all seems forced.  It’s not a bad story, and might have made a good premise for a novel or for a film, even.  But the episode is too short and the show’s episodic nature too limiting for it to really work.

The Immunity Syndrome:  A pretty good unbeatable space monster episode, this one features some very cool Spock and McCoy bits.  As the crew is stretched beyond the breaking point, tensions run high, and friendship is tested.  There are echoes of this episode in the films, especially The Motion Picture and Wrath of Khan.  And I really enjoy Tired Kirk.

A Piece of the Action:  What can I say?  This is one seriously goofy episode.  It’s filled with cornball dialog, a pretty silly plot, more Kirk and crew getting captured than a dozen other episodes combined, and gag after gag after gag.  Shatner hams it up on an epic level.  Everyone else seems at a bit of a loss.  But the image of Kirk and Spock in gangster attire is awesome.

By Any Other Name:  Kind of an interesting Lovecraft vibe to this episode.  Not great, but fun.  And there are some great lines and performances.  Scotty says the classic “It’s green!” line that I’ve always loved.  It also has a great bit of Kirk seduction.

Return to Tomorrow:  If nothing else, this episode has a great monologue from Kirk about risk and benefit that sums up my own views of space exploration and technology.  Otherwise, it’s a pretty typical ‘possession’ episode.  The actors get a chance to play out of character for a bit, especially Nimoy, who gets to ham it up as a smug villain.  Shatner does some fantastically crazy Kirk-acting in this one, contorting his body as he pauses and rushes through dialog.  I think everyone’s impersonation of Shatner could come from this episode alone.

Patterns of Force:  A powerful episode, this story deals with some pretty dark subjects, though in typical Trek form, intermixes a bit of humor, especially with Spock.  When a historian decides to help a primitive world, he introduces an old Earth philosophy, and things get out of hand.  An examination on power, hatred, and the lessons of history.  One of the strongest episodes of the second season.

The Ultimate Computer:  Kirk and crew face the possibility of being replaced by machines in this pretty cool episode.  The always awesome William Marshal plays a computer genius who may have a few circuits crossed.  Good, tense action.  Some awesome Kirk moments.  And a great, enraged McCoy.

The Omega Glory:  This episode starts out well enough.  A missing ship, a crew mysteriously missing or dead, a paradise planet below with two warring factions.  Everything is going along fairly smoothly.  And then it all falls apart in the last ten minutes as episode writer Gene Roddenberry pulls out all the stops and bashes us over the head with some of the worst, heavy handed, uncomfortably patriotic allegory this side of a John Wayne movie.  The last ten minutes actually turn this into one of my vary least favorite episodes of the whole series.

Assignment: Earth:  An attempted spin-off of Star Trek, as an episode, this really doesn’t work.  It’s totally out of whack as far as tone and even setting.  There are some cool ideas introduced, and Garry 7 might have made for a good lead in his own show.  But overall, a weak finish to the second season.

    A bad start and a bad ending, the season still had plenty of great highlights.  It was a lot of fun watching the episodes in order.  Though you see less progress/change than in the first half of the first season.  I really do love this show.  A different time, but one filled with wonder.

    Check out my reviews for season one, here.

-Matt