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Star Trek: The Original Series 315-316 (Patreon)

Published:
2025-03-12 12:00:07
Edited:
2026-01-07 18:52:34
Imported:
2026-06
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Comments

MrCAL

As you start to approach the end of TOS and look forward towards the TOS movies, I just wanted to suggest an idea going forward (if you haven't already) If you wanted to mix it up, rather than watching all the TOS movies in a row, you could instead alternate between a TNG season and a TOS movie? TNG S1 •Star Trek: Motion Picture TNG S2 •Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan TNG S3 •Star Trek: Search for Spock TNG S4 •Star Trek: The Voyage Home TNG S5 •Star Trek: Final frontier TNG S6 •Star Trek: Undiscovered country TNG S7 Then you'd be ready to start the TNG movies. Just an idea.

Itbewhatitbe

question, does the events of the movies carry into TNG? cause if they do in anyway, then they cant really do this right?

droodly

The cone-nipple people will rule this world!

MrCAL

Other than the fact that all the TOS movies are set before even the first episode of TNG, at the top of my head, there isn't any major crossover that would be a problem. The TNG movies would be a different case, but that's way down the line.

Joe Concepts

Is there a reason not to do release-order for these? 5 and 6 were released during TNG, and one of them vaguely connects to TNG.

Joe Concepts

Your title analysis is funny because another reaction channel tries to avoid the title until they see it on screen in the episode. To be completely spoiler-free. Maybe it's overdoing it a little, but certain TNG titles give away a recurring guest star, so in that case it's better. With TOS it really doesn't matter much.

Rupert Purcat

Kirk chose not to take any sides since he had no information, just each one's view of their own truth. Kirk's goal was simple - do not let them harm each other and take them to Starbase 4 for the federation to undertake the proper investigations and let a court decide. Both Spok and Kirk disagreed with Beal when having drinks and stated the only thing they know is that he took a shuttle. I am surprised a bit that you both did not see the importance of this. At this point in time there were massacres under apartheid in south africa and segregation still existed in much of the US. Think on Hidden Figures. Scotty was pissed they fked with his engineering, and Kirk will never let someone take his loved enterprise from him. This is such a current episode is a post fact/truth society in a world where wealthy seek to divide for profits. The discussions at around the 36 min mark should be discussed in schools. But alas certain government's are defunding schools or only teaching Xi's thoughts. George was close, the official answer is Nipple Clamp Controls

Joe Concepts

I think some people see the race issue here as being way too obvious. But I think the whole point is Kirk and Spock's response to Lokai's explanation of the skin colors. They're like "what the hell is he talking about?" Just showing the absurdity of disliking another race because of their color. What more hopeful future idea is there than people being just completely baffled by racism?

Joe Concepts

Notice, Bele says the slavery ended many years ago. So it's definitely a reference to racial issues of the day, where Black people weren't slaves but still feeling the affects of oppression. I think though, we are not supposed to think Kirk is wrong. The idea I think is just against political violence in general. Maybe suggesting violence, even on both sides, is wrong.

Actuarial Lurker

Let That Be Your Last Battlefield is heavy handed and obvious but on point for what had just happened in the US in 1968 with MLK Jr. and RFK Senior, race riots, Viet Nam, Apartheid, decolonization of Africa and South East Asia

Actuarial Lurker

Actor Frank Gorshin who plays the half white/black "hunter" was the Riddler in the classic Batman TV series of the late 1960s

Actuarial Lurker

My father was in the military in the last 1950s-mid 1960s...just before I was born. He (White) and three friends (one White, one Filipino, one African American) drove across the US while on leave to tour local cities- going South and then across the Midwest. The local motels would NOT let the Filipino and Black guys stay even though they were in uniform and this overlapped Vietnam. So all 4 slept in their car in the parking lost so the other guests would see that the staff wouldn't let active military patronize due to their race. So even though BLM style events still happen- it was still BAD when TOS was on air

Actuarial Lurker

I think Simone is right. Since it is supposed to be 2266-2269 then they are 300 years "ahead" of the 1960s strife and 400 years removed from the US Civil War. It is like contemporary people being shocked by people being drawn and quartered in Elizabethan times...

Actuarial Lurker

The first "Earth Day" was held in 1970, and overpopulation became front and center in the late 1960s in light of Paul Ehrlich's 1968 book "the Population Bomb". Think of the 1971 song "I'd Like to Change The World" by the band Ten Years After talking about overbreeding etc....

TanyoScatto

should just watch them in release order, so 1-4, then TNG, then 5 after tng 2x18, then 6 after tng 5x09

Sergio Meira

I think racism and its consequences were pretty much a hot topic in the 60's, when Ep. 15 was made and broadcast. To see the Enterprise and its crew feel pity because this race destroyed itself for insignificant differentes ("He's white on the RIGHT side! That's disgusting!") was both a message about said differences being insignificant, and what happens if we never go past the stage of hating each other for past wrongs. All in all, quite an episode, I think, with some progressive ideas that clearly haven't really been accepted even today (see Trump vs. DEI). What is an injustice, and what should we do when facing one? Is Lokai right for despising Kirk's "idealism" and wanting to go on with actual fighting? Is this like Malcom X and Dr. King?...

Sergio Meira

It's true that the execution can sometimes destroy your feeling of imersion, or even be downright funny... but remember that we're speaking from 70 years in the future, after lots of great things have happened in movies and TV. It's not like the creators of Star Trek had the experience of watching Breaking Bad, or The Sopranos, or even just DS9 or Babylon 5. It's the other way round: the shows that came later benefitted from experiments that were made in previous shows, and one of the disadvantages of doing experiments is that, when you fail, you fail, and the evidence is forever on tape. To audiences that had never seen much better shows, Star Trek was great television, not only in the messages and ideas (where it can still be great even today), but also in the cinematography and execution. In some cases, the audiences simply had never seen anything much better, especially in a TV show, because better things hadn't been invented yet.

Sergio Meira

It is indeed true that hatred that comes from being shackled is not the same as hatred that comes simply from fear of what is different. Yet in the end hatred is as hatred does, and whatever the source of your hatred, once you start doing unreasonable things to get back at your enemies... where does it end? Or, in other words -- does the final result (killing each other off) becomes better if the hatred of at least one of the parties is at least partially justified? Or is the result still the same? Personally, I will side with MLK on this. If we don't let go of our grudges at some point, it's not going to end well, no matter how justified our grudges may be.

Mike FromOz

"We can give you trillions of condoms" "I'm sorry, but we've tried that. Our mighty alien penises just break right through them"

Nicholas Bielik

There's a story that was recounted on a Star Trek podcast that I listened to years ago that might be worth sharing. A woman wrote to Roddenberry when she was older and told him about how this episode had helped her when she was a young person. She was a white, and she lived in the American south. Her family were racist and, despite being raised around this mentality, she had always felt uncomfortable with the views that would be quite openly expressed by her family. When she saw this episode, it confirmed in her the feeling that her family's racism was wrong, and she promised herself that she would not abide such beliefs as she got older. The woman felt that this episode was a catalyst in her growth as person and allowed her to see beyond the hate she was raised with. The episode might be cheesy and heavy handed in some ways, but the bluntness of the message clearly had an impact.

Bruce Woodcock

You guys definitely missed a few things. Lokai's people were no longer enslaved; they had been freed for thousands of years earlier. But according to Lokai his people were still being oppressed, without full rights. And according to Bele, they were too violent for full rights. So imagine if the racism of the 1950s and 60s had continued, and black people had been confined to small enclaves. This was more about equal rights, apartheid, and domestic terrorism, not about slavery. And about racial prejudice. No matter how much Lokai's people were oppressed, Bele's people thought they were inherently too violent to be allowed more freedom.

Badger

Gosh, how I hated this episode as a kid but all grown up now I can see it as such an important episode. The views in the 60s and 70s were very different. I was born and raised in Southern Oregon, and to this day we have a black population of about 3%. I remember being about 10 in the 70's sitting next to my grandmas watching TV and all of a sudden she would sit up, grab your arm and say "Is that a black man?".. Literally gone her entire life without meeting anyone that wasn't pasty white, homegrown and church goin. So I imagine this didn't play very well in the bible belt portion of the country. As for the make-up I can't seem them doing it any other way, back then..They couldn't hire either color actor and try to make the other half the opposite color..I bet they tried though.. The original story concept did not depict the aliens with bi-colored skin. Gene Coon originally had a devil with a tail - chasing an angel. Episode director Jud Taylor came up with the idea of bi-colored skin shortly before the episode began filming. His original suggestion was that they be half-black/half-white, one color from the waist up and the other from the waist down, but each wearing reversed color schemes. The central idea stuck, but the colors were finally separated along the vertical axis, rather than along the horizontal. ---------------------- As for Gideon I took it as an allegory of religion taken to the extreme, without trying to bring attention that it is making fun of it.. Very sneaky...Also, a very Catholicism approach to no birth control, no abortions, thall shall not kill taken even more seriously..etc.. Odd part to me-I guess Prime Directive means he transports her back to get everyone infected, and they go on thweir merry way...

JayF

Ep 15 is my favorite of ST:TOS. It pointed out racism for what we perceive to be an absurd difference but was also saying how absurd our reasons for it are. For historical context this episode aired the same year that Mr. Rogers famously bathed his feet in a wading pool with Officer Clemmons (a black man) on his TV show because of racial tensions in the US over integration of swimming pools (yes Bill Burr, this was sadly actually a thing).

Itbewhatitbe

you know what it is, im guessing like myself, you are older than S&G, possibly decade(s)? and in their youthful eyes, this level of criticism about racism is really really on the nose and obvious, just the fact of progress over time. it feels like theres no subtlety, but thats because they are literally born into a world thats already progressed further than this, not everyone, but on average. theres probably stuff i watched that were consider very old back when i was their age, and i would've felt that it was a bit on the nose and too obvious to be an interesting plot.

JayF

Yes I'm in my mid-50s, born shortly after this aired.

Skyruff Creative

You two were more entertaining than these two episodes. Lol. I grew up with the original Star Trek. Even then we knew the show had budget and writing issues. it’s just so hard to explain how even with all its faults, it was still some of the best TV overall let alone sci-fi. Other popular shows at the time were The Andy Griffith Show, Lassie and Gomer Pyle as examples of the quality of writing / budgets for TV.

Music

I don’t care what you think, I loved both these episodes (and I’ll forever be mad at George for not liking Mirror, Mirror 😂). I first saw them as a child and they are two that I always remembered (there are a bunch that I really liked, and these are included). I thought Episode 15 explained the absurdity of racism so well and it what I thought was a surprising way. For Episode 16, I remember being scared by all those faces in the windows, and the over-population problem was also a scary concept for a kid. So, a couple of my favorites from Season 3.

Alan Kobb

With Let That be Your Last Battlefield, the basic message was simply the stupidity of judging someone based on the color of their skin, and the horrible end result that could come of such hatred turning to war. In this case, the Federation has little information to go on. As it turns out, they are the last of their species, but not knowing this, the wise course is to stay out of it until you know much more. You might join the side of those who claim oppression, only to find that they are not the angels that they profess to be. It is usually not wise to get involved in a conflict over meaningless hatred, and you can see the accusations that both Loki and the Commissioner slung toward Kirk and the Federation the moment that they showed even the willingness to listen to either. In the late 1960s, the US was fighting racial discrimination, and there were people on both sides of this that were trying to turn it into a real war. You've probably heard of Martin Luther King, and his message of peace, but he was not speaking in a vacumn. There were others like Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale who founded the Black Panthers and preached a much more violent solution. In this show, Loki is much like Seale. You say that you would probably support the oppressed, but would you really have followed someone who preaches violence?? Like Roddenberry, I've never felt that violence is a good solution.

Itbewhatitbe

i think you may have misunderstood lol, as a lot of ppl did when he said "remember that terrible mirror universe episode". he was referring to The Alternative Factor, with the bad beard and cheesy inverted effect, not Mirror Mirror.

Music

Maybe. But I also think at the end of that episode he said he didn’t like it. But that was a while ago in season 2, so I don’t remember exactly.

Itbewhatitbe

just searched for star trek 204 and relistened to their post episode discussion. he said he it was really good but that some things came across as funny due to the shows age, but that the episode felt ahead of its time. Simone agrees with everything he said and even added her own similar thoughts. https://www.patreon.com/posts/star-trek-tos-114591505 right here.

Music

I guess I’ve been unfairly angry. 😂😂

Itbewhatitbe

lol i think its kinda funny and says a lot about internet culture that in general, ppl are much more forgiving/forgetful when a beautiful woman says something, or the same thing as someone who isnt a beautiful woman. the amount of times ive seen comments on here of ppl giving george shit for guessing (both correctly and incorrectly) but never once at simone who does it just as much, sometimes more often.

Alan Kobb

The Mark of Gideon is a similar, poorly disguised attempt to opine on worries of the late 1960s. In this case, a fear that cities have become overpopulated has entered the news. In reality, since most of the people living in cities were poor people and minorities, this was a case of rich versus poor discrimination because the proposed "solutions" to this "problem" bordered on the horrible in human terms. Thankfully, we got past this and discovered that the cities were not overpopulated, just different from how they were before two world wars.

Dee Aitch

That makes a lot more sense. I assumed that "mirror episode with the bad beard" meant "Mirror Mirror" as well.

Simone's Coconut Squire

Re: Mark of Gideon "Oh I survived? I can go back and take your place now" Um... so why was you Dad so insistent that you not get medical help and maybe die? You might want to check if he has a life insurance policy on you girl.

Simone's Coconut Squire

I feel like this episode very subtly "both sides"ed the issue in the episode. I think the writers were trying to paint Lokai as sort of a perpetual victim that was contributing to the problem to a degree. Many of the things he complained about were awful, but it was pointed out that was no longer the case on the planet (e.g. slavery), but more especially we see it in his reactions to Kirk. When the captain would say innocuous and/or rational things like "lets NOT just kill this guy" Lokai would throw a tantrum as if Kirk was taking sides against him. Overall the scales are tipped in Lokai's favor, but the writers didn't let him get away blameless.

Simone's Coconut Squire

316: I feel like a lot of sci-fi of this time period suffered from this "space wizard" kind of writing where people were just expected to overlook giant plot holes because "its way in the future and some technology/space/alien thingy explains it".

gfixler

Gideon being so out of space, and deciding the best plan was to to somehow build the entire Enterprise, which is 24 stories tall, with hundreds and hundreds of rooms, just so they could trick Kirk into making one of them sick, while countless others bounced around like gas molecules outside, has all the energy of the Monty Python crew forgetting to get inside the giant, wooden rabbit, and then Sir Bedivere saying "Maybe if we built a large, wooden badger..."

windyWin

I can't help but notice Shatner's pronunciation of sabotage.

michael mccafferty

"Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" was first broadcast on January, 1969. Presumably it was written in late 1968. Martin Luther King Jr, who gave his iconic "I have a dream" speech in 1963, was assassinated in April, 1968. Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated in June of 1968. The US was fighting the Vietnam war and violent anti-war protests occurred across the country. America drafted eligible males into the army, but sons of wealthy families could game the system and buy a deferral. In America in the 1960s, black families had been systematically prevented from accumulating wealth, so the draft disproportionately affected blacks. They had been slaves, they were now "free," but they were not equal and they were definitely hauled out of their homes to go fight in someone else's war.

Robert Evans

People have already made the point that Bele stated that the slavery had ended a thousand years ago and Lokai protested injusticed continued. Very much a direct commentary on American slaver followed by 'Jim Crow' still very much in effect. I think one aspect where they *tried* to make Lokai's position less 'justified' is notice how often he hurls derogatory comments at the crew for being 'mono-toned.' He held and nursed his own racisms.

Robert Evans

I grew up watching re-run after re-run of TOS but this was the first time I noticed that in the final bridge scene you can see actor Lou Antonio (Lokai) dodging to the right after runing into the turbolift so it would be clear for Frank Gorshin (Bele) on his exit.

Simon Pegged Me

I'll quibble with you on a small point, the statement about Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale offering a violent solution to racial discrimination in late-1960s American. It's not accurate. Huey Newton and Bobby Seale founded the Black Panther Party as The Black Panther Party for Self-Defense. It had other goals, especially later on, but the goal for self-defense was to protect black people from the predatory Oakland police department that preyed upon their community. To do that, they formed armed patrols that followed police officers in their neighborhood, ready to retaliate for any violence committed by the police on black residents. Their goals grew with their ambition and success, but at no time did they call for the violent overthrow of the U.S. government, a race war, or a violent end to racial discrimination. That was misinformation spread by the FBI in its campaign to break up the party.

Simon Pegged Me

I think you're right, Simone's Coconut Squire. They did try their best to paint Lokai as a perpetual victim, modeling him after the civil rights leaders or the way civil rights leaders were seen by the conservative elements of U.S. society. Slavery ended in 1865, yet they continued to blame their condition on whites, with MLK asking for equality with his March on Washington and Malcolm X addressing the United Nations, asking the assembled nations who condemned apartheid in South Africa and colonialism in the rest of continent if they would have the courage to condemn racism in the United States. Even after the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, they continued to point out the systemic racism they felt persisted despite recent gains. In 1968, Lokai probably looked familiar—even in his fun house mirror appearance—to millions of viewers.

Simon Pegged Me

Gideon still freaks me out a little. The thought of drawing my curtain and seeing heads pressed against my window staring in at me is hauntingly unsettling. Everything else about the episode? Meh. But the gawking heads things is just creepy.

Alan Kobb

Fair enough. You are correct in the details, however wiser heads did recognize at the time that armed retaliation could easily deteriorate into a race war.

Kurt Hockenbury

Sometime after you finish TOS, you should watch Forbidden Planet (1956) because (a) it's a classic SciFi movie and (b) you can see where Gene Roddenberry's creation of Star Trek was influenced by what had come before.

Michael Bauer

I get that it seems odd to you that Lokai is presented not as immediately sympathetic (nor treated that way) even though he represents the oppressed (which admittedly our crew don't know - all they have are the reports of these two). But I think some nuance isn't a bad thing - of course oppression is bad, but that doesn't mean that everyone who is oppressed or fighting to free themselves from oppression does so with justifiable means (nor does a good cause make any and all means justifiable), nor is the "good side" free from people who instrumentalize others to fight their battles. And in the end - relentless hate and anger, even if justified, will take its toll on a person, and might very well make them cold and ruthless, willing to sacrifice others for their cause. Beyond the anti-racism message, this episode about what hatred does to people.

StonyD

NCC = Naval Construction Contract. In the real world, they chose it because that's how the Navy registers their ships. In fiction, I assume it stands for something else, or it's an affection that's stuck around in future culture.

StonyD

Lokai stole a shuttlecraft and had open racial hostility himself. He was not meant to automatically be a sympathetic character, and instead be representative of race relations in reality at the time, given the violent Black Panthers, etc. that had committed acts of low level domestic terror at this point. This presents a more nuanced realistic approach to a complex social issue, as all actual "Star Trek" does. Trek doesn't judge. It lays out the facts for the viewer and allows you to come to your own proper conclusions. That's why this franchise lasted as long as it did. It's awesome.

Brent bmc_comix

Now, I hope you guys finally understand why it is canonical that Bones HATES having to use the transporter! :)

Brent bmc_comix

Oh also, REMEMBER that destruct sequence!!!

Michael Kemmet

"What does NCC mean?" is a question without a good or precise answer. Background #1: Since 1920, US Navy ships have a two-part alphanumeric designation. The preceding letters indicate the type of vessel; the following numbers indicate exactly which vessel it is. For example, the three modern Enterprises(two past, one future) are CV-6(1938-1947), CVN-65(1961-2017), & CVN-80(est. 2028-). C=carrier, V=fixed wing(as opposed to rotary wing - aka helicopters), N=nuclear powered. Background #2: Civilian airplane registries also use an alphanumeric code. For example, a private plane in the '60s could have had the code(tail number): NC-17780. N=United States, C=standard airworthiness Background #3: Gene Roddenberry was a US Army Air Corps (predecessor to the US Air Force) pilot in WW2, so he was familiar with the hull number system in use with the Navy. But he was also very familiar with the different system the Navy had in place for naming aircraft. For example, the Corsair was designated: F4U. F=fighter, U=Vought(the manufacturer), 4=the fourth fighter design accepted from Vought by the Navy. So how did NCC-1701 come about? The most real answer(but also the most boring) is that one of the art designers was also a private pilot and owned an older plane with a tail number similar to what I wrote above. He thought the ship model needed something more than just Yorktown(the original planned name) or Enterprise, and used the registry number for his plane as inspiration. He didn't think NC- looked balanced when written out, so he added a second C to make it NCC. At this point, the letters didn't mean anything, they were just there to make the model look better. All three real-world naming schemes have been used to try and come up with an in-universe meaning for NCC. Sources tied to the designer say it meant Naval Construction Contract or Naval Construction Code. Other sources that took inspiration from the Navy aircraft system say it meant Navy-Curtis Craft(referring to a future fictional company that designed/built the ship for Starfleet). Still other non-canon sources in the '70s adapted a more Navy ship style meaning of (N)ew (C)ommand (C)ruiser. But at the end of the day, it was really only there to make the model look better and doesn't really mean anything. Not the most satisfying answer, but it's the most honest. Addendum #1: There was an attempt by a couple Star Trek authors in the 80s/90s to use the Naval Construction Contract/Code version and also give meaning to the numbers. The 17- would be the 17th major ship class, and the -01 would be which ship of the class in order of construction. Using this system, NCC-1700 would've been USS Constitution and the first ship of the 17th class. Enterprise would have been the second Constitution-class ship built to get the 1701 hull number. A variant of this version was in a novel where Enterprise was the lead ship in the class and originally was going to be 1700, but so many changes were made late in the design that the ship got a new number: 1701. Addendum #2: In 'The Doomsday Machine', the prop makers needed to show a very damaged Constitution-class ship(USS Constellation), but they didn't want to damage their shooting model and they didn't have the time or budget to build a second. Since the ship was mostly going to be filmed from a distance, they ran to a local store and bought a copy of the newly released Enterprise toy model kit and gave it battle damage. They chose the hull number for this new ship from what numbers they had available from the decals in the model kit: 0, 1, 1, & 7. So the hull number for the Constellation became NCC-1017. In hindsight, they really should have chosen 1710 instead. That would have made so much more sense. But that just reinforces how much they were making up on the spot, and how little planning there was being done for the future. Continuity be damned; they just needed to get the episodes finished and out the door in time.

Patrick - Excelsior

This is NOT a favorite episode. I always thought this one was stupid. Too many holes in plot. Many you have described. A people that love life too much to use birth control but are ok with suicide. The scene where the daughter is sick in bed, the father ask his daughter what pain felt like. WTH. Has he never stubbed his toe? Bumped his head? Scrapped a knee? I mean how f*ing perfect are these people? She should have replied by grabbing his nipples and twisting, "That's what pain feels like daddy." Starfleet acting like a bunch of wimpy putz. The goofy guards all grinning like idiots all the time. Planets that crowded but they make room for this elaborate ship replica. They could have had some stuck doors to limit where Kirk could go, save an ass-load of room. Reduce some crowding. I've been in some incredibly crowded rooms, with thousands of people where we where all pressed up against each other. I never heard everyone heartbeat. Did they really think he would fall so in love with her, he would give up his life for ever AFTER SHE DIED, to continue to get people sick after knowing her for 1 hour? This is a perfect planet of complete morons.

Angzarr

1:06... I came here to watch Star Trek and chew bubblegum, and I'm all out of bubblegum.

Angzarr

George, galactic north and south is a real thing. They are directions parallel to the axis of rotation and perpendicular to the disc of the galaxy ("galactic equator"). Which is which? If viewed from the north, the Milky Way is spinning clockwise. If viewed from the south, it's spinning counterclockwise. Earth's axis and the galactic axis are off by about 60 degrees, but our north pole does point into the northern galactic hemisphere. Our solar system oscillates above and below the galactic equator. Currently we're very slightly to the north by a measly few tens of light years, which on galactic scale is nothing (for comparison, we're ~26000 light years from the center) There, everything you need to know about galactic navigation! Now you won't get lost.

Cally

My extremely unlikely headcanon concerning the Gideon situation. I think some idiot at Starfleet/Federation did a deal with the Gideons to access their medical data for ways to boost longevity. In return they gave them plans of the Enterprise and arranged for Kirk to be there. There are several possible (non-lethal) solutions to the overpopulation problem, which is caused purely because the Gideons can't keep it in their pants: maybe teach them how to masturbate, or promote homosexuality. Failing that, put bromide in their water.