Space Nazis!\u00a0 In the immortal words of Dr. Zachary Smith, \u201cOh the pain, the pain.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Enterprise is headed for stellar system blah, blah, blah where there are two planets with humanoid life.\u00a0 One planet, Zeon, is more advanced and peaceful.\u00a0 The other, Ekos, is less advanced and warlike.\u00a0 The Federation sent an observer ten years earlier name John Gill who was an historian that Kirk knew from back at the Academy.\u00a0 Nothing has been heard from him for years.\u00a0 Their mission is to establish communications with Gill and find out how conditions on Ekos are progressing.\u00a0 As the Enterprise nears Ekos a missile with an H-bomb approaches and has to be destroyed.\u00a0 Ekos should not have that level of technology so Spock and Kirk go down to the planet expecting trouble.<\/p>\n
When they beam down they find that the Ekosians are dressed as Nazi soldiers and they are treating the Zeonians as the Nazis treated the Jews during their time in power.\u00a0 We get several episodes of Kirk and Spock dressed as Nazis trying to infiltrate the Nazi headquarters to reach John Gill who they learn is the F\u00fchrer of the Ekosian Nazi state.<\/p>\n
They are captured, jailed, whipped and threatened.\u00a0 Eventually they escape by manufacturing a laser out of the transponders that were subcutaneously emplaced under Kirk and Spock\u2019s skin as a way to locate and rescue them if their communicators were lost.\u00a0 They escape to the sewers where they join up with the underground resistance of Ekosians and Zeonians.\u00a0 Eventually they reach John Gill.\u00a0 They find he\u2019s been drugged and he eventually explains that he used the Nazi model as one that could overcome the disorganized nature of Ekosian society.\u00a0 It worked but then Melakon, his deputy, drugged him and seized power with the intent of going full tilt Nazi.\u00a0 At this point the final solution is about to be unleashed on the Zeonians.\u00a0 Kirk rouses Gill and forces him to make a speech denouncing the treatment of the Zeonians and blaming Melakon.\u00a0 Melakon shoots Gill and is himself shot by the soldiers present.\u00a0 The Ekosians renounce Nazism and focus on manufacturing high end automobiles.<\/p>\n
What can I say?\u00a0 What can anyone say?\u00a0 Space Nazis!<\/p>\n
So let\u2019s get down to it.\u00a0 Shatner has moments where he embraces his Kirkian magnificence.\u00a0 At the beginning when McCoy is rambling on about what could have happened to Professor Gill Kirk very good naturedly reminds him that that is exactly what he and Spock are heading down to the planet to find out.\u00a0 Later on when he is being whipped in the Gestapo dungeon he does a great Shatner pain face.\u00a0 Not full intensity, but more as if an annoying hemorrhoid were flaring up.\u00a0 Later on Spock has to climb on Kirk\u2019s recently whipped back to reach a light bulb placed high on the prison cell wall to work his Rube Goldberg laser device.\u00a0 Kirk reminds him very pointedly about the high quality of the whipping he had received and stresses that time is of the essence to finish the maneuver before Kirk collapses in pain.\u00a0 The exchange may actually be the humorous high point of the episode.\u00a0 A few funny non-Shatner lines are thrown in.\u00a0 When Kirk and Spock are first disguising themselves in Nazi uniforms Spock notes that Kirk will make a very convincing Nazi.\u00a0 Later on when Spock is brought before the deputy F\u00fchrer, he has to stand passively by as the high ranking official gives a very insulting description of Spock\u2019s physiognomy in pseudo-scientific terms that highlight the supposedly degenerate aspects of his distinctive ears and eyes.\u00a0 Spock\u2019s expressions while listening to the lecture are amusing.<\/p>\n
Space Nazis!<\/p>\n
I give this episode 4 \/\/ 7.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Space Nazis!\u00a0 In the immortal words of Dr. Zachary Smith, \u201cOh the pain, the pain.\u201d The Enterprise is headed for stellar system blah, blah, blah<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[237,4,244,2149,240],"tags":[2150,2742,38,1355,44,309,265,1691,293,154,1692,837],"class_list":["post-12716","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","category-sff","category-sff-tv-reviews","category-star-trek","category-tv-reviews","tag-gene-roddenberry","tag-patterns-of-force","tag-review","tag-reviews","tag-sci-fi","tag-sci-fi-tv-review","tag-science-fiction","tag-sff-tv-show-reviews","tag-star-trek","tag-tv-review","tag-tv-reviews","tag-william-shatner"],"yoast_head":"\n