Thursday, October 01, 2015

17 to 01: Amok TIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIME!

"Amok Time" is in everyone's top five episodes of Star Trek, right?

This thing is superbly directed, written, and acted. Is there a better episode of TOS? I don't know guys. This episode is just really, really good.

Episodes of 17 to 01 are available on iTunes. It updates Thursdays at 01:00 AM CT and Friday nights at 8:30 PM ET / 9:30 CT. We're also amazingly on Stitcher.

3 comments:

SkilTao said...

I did not notice how carefully this episode frames shots--thanks for pointing that out. And yeah, can't tell if that thing Spock holds behind his back is a stylus, a knife, or if he sharpened his toothbrush into a shiv. Also can't tell if the hallway scenes have more female crewman or not, to frame Spock against.

Wait what, T'Pau's crown is made of her own braids?!

I thought this ep did a fair job representing culture shock, though I'm not sure if it being a life or death matter was intentional commentary or not. And on that note, right before Kirk accepts the challenge, it seems like Kirk wants to make the best impression he possibly can on T'Pau, so it's really weird to me that he'd make such exaggerated pointing gestures in her direction - wasn't that rude in the '60s? (Yeah, I know it give the talking scene more energy, but still. Maybe the wedding party turned away to watch Ceremonial Shaking of Bells.)

I *have* been wanting to rewatch Babylon 5. (I need to get the quote about how stations 1-4 were lost, for reasons.)

"Humans are weak and slow! Let me give him battle drugs, to make this more sporting." So... are they planning to keep McCoy's cheating a secret from T'Pau? Would Spock's property on Vulcan get fined or something? Seems like there should be some fallout.

I super enjoy how, as Spock is preparing to beam up at the end, his theme song is played like sad cowboy music.

VanVelding said...

Hey man, T'Pau is on fleek. Always has been. Always will be. You have to be a certain percentage on fleek to even near The Federation Council and T'Pau is 100% with that hair-crown.

The thing about Kirk is that his passions constantly override his better judgement. He's a good, compassionate person, but he just gets so caught up about his ship, his crew, and his Spock that he loses sight of that. He just gets angry sometimes. He goes too far sometimes, man. He just goes too far. He's the first one to admit it!

That's a really good point about the consequences. Maybe T'Pau just never knew until years later. Like, she's got 15 Vulcan weddings to officiate this week alone. Who's got time to hear rumors about human captains? OTOH, the way T'Pring played the system might motivate her to look the other way. I imagine SPOX News, the fair and balanced source of Vulcan xenophobic news, had a field day with it. ;)

IIRC, the story of the first four Babylon stations was...https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g3YiPC91QUk

SkilTao said...

SPOX news update: Starfleet manual adds a chapter on "faking your death," have DANGEROUS CRIMINALS escaped their logical demise??? Also, revisions to chapter on fleek.

So Commander Sinclair is Lancelot? Sounds about right.