Star Trek Volume 36
featuring the episodes Whom Gods Destroy and The Mark Of Gideon
Not two of my favorite episodes, these two hours have their boosters, and I’ve never really figured out why. Garth of Izar, the chief baddie of Whom Gods Destroy, never really fascinated me that much…and yet these days he’s got his own novels. Trek had already done the “inmates running the asylum” gag with Dagger Of The Mind, and this outing even used some of that previous episode’s props and setpieces (the conditioning chair’s emitter lights are, in fact, Dagger’s Van Gelder machine!). Bleh. And yet, this show has some ardent fans - enough people that a book can be aimed at them. Shows you what I know. The most fascinating thing I take away from this is Kirk and Spock’s chess-inspired identity check.
The Mark Of Gideon, on the other hand, tries to be a clever tale of the dangers of overpopulation, but what I’d like to know is where, on a planet so densely packed with people that everyone’s standing shoulder-to-shoulder, they found enough space to build a life-size replica of the Enterprise. Wouldn’t someone have protested this rather bizarre public works project? (Then again, who protests bizarre public works projects on this planet anymore - or, at the very least, who can get those protests listened to?) It’s an interesting problem for the show to tackle, but the convoluted story and that key lack-of-credibility problem eats away at my ability to take it seriously. Even the previously fascinating story of Kirk-trapped-alone-on-the-Enterprise had been done earlier in the season with Wink Of An Eye, and that doesn’t count any previous seasons’ use of the idea.
No extras, as per usual with the original Trek DVDs, and not much to recommend the episodes either.