Series: Star Trek (The Original Series)
Episode: 1.07 What are Little Girls Made Of (10/20/66)
Rating: 4/5
Redshirt Status: 2/18 (does not include non-crewmembers like Kirby)
Notable Guest Stars:
Michael Strong – Dr. Richard Kirby. Strong doesn’t have an extensive filmography, but he is the main episodic character for this episode.
Sherry Jackson – Andrea. She played the daughter of Danny Thomas on the Danny Thomas Show for five years.
Ted Cassidy – Ruk. You might recognize him as Lurch from The Addams Family.
Harry Basch- Dr. Brown. Basch did several televisions shows, notably Falcon’s Crest. He also wrote several travel guides.
I would have added Majel Barret, but since I know she is in the show frequently, I have decided she is a main character, abit more minor then others.
Review:
This episode was directed by James Goldstone (who directed the second pilot) and written by Robert Bloch
Christine Chapel, the ships head nurse, has a fiancee that has been missing for teh last five years. Her service on the Enterprise was her means of getting to the planet he was last seen. Her fiancee, Roger Kirby, was an archeological immunilogist and had been looking into the ruins.
Kirk, sympthatic but not expecting much warns her that he may be dead. Surprisingly, they find Kirby, but that is probably the last truely happy scene in this episode.
Kirk spends the rest of the episode arguing with Kirby on androids. Christine spends the rest of the episode cataloguing how Kirby isn’t her Roger.
This episode is interesting, and the idea is repeated in several Trek series. Most notably Voyager, where a species of Android have fought each other after destroying those who made them. TNG, due to Data, has several episodes on Androids and the policies around them. From my limited knowledge of the later TV series, Picard also deals with the idea of Androids and whether they are a good idea or not.
Interesting Notes:
- This was the first episode of the series to be repeated on NBC
- According to an interview with Syfy, there was a person on set whose job it was to make sure that Sherry Jackson didn’t have a wardrobe malfunction. Given her outfit, I can imagine that job had some merit. Hopefully it was more comfortable then it looked.
- So Chapel’s backstory was that she was in biomedical research and switched to serving on a starship to find her fiance. I wonder what her actual degree is. They never really say. She might have a graduate degree in a specialty and then went and got her nurses degree. Or not. I wish we knew more.
- Kirk knew that using the term half breed would alert Spock that something was wrong.
Pros:
- I like Christine Chapel as a character, so I like seeing Episodes where she isn’t background noise.
- I love the friendship between Uhura and Chapel.
- Chapel teases Spock about being engaged. Kirk is amused and Spock takes it with a simple raised eyebrow. I kind of like the idea that she is comfortable enough to do that after The Naked Time events.
Cons:
- the lighting in this episode is awkward
Sokorra Lewis 