Series: Star Trek (The Original Series)
Episode: 3.20 The Way to Eden (02-21-1969)
Rating: 2/5
Redshirt Status: 0/9/58
Notable Guest Stars:
Skip Homeier – Dr. Sevrin
Charles Napier – Adam. He would appear again in Deep Space Nine.
Elizabeth Rogers – Lt. Palmer
Mary Linda Rapelye – Irina. She appeared on several soap operas over the years. Her most recent credit was 2009’s The Proposal.
Review:
I find this episode interesting as apparently it started off as a completely different story. Originally the story was meant to introduce McCoy’s estranged daughter Joanna McCoy. So many edits were done to the story that D.C. Fontana decided she was going to use an alias, not wanting to be fully associated with the script anymore. The initial plot sounds interesting, and I’m sad it never got to see the screen. The only bit I did not like was the idea of making Joanna a love interest for Kirk. I felt that was overused and continues to be a bit overused in the 2009 film series. This script did affect the later Kelvin Timeline for McCoy’s background, and the Animated series (which I will watch next).
The beginning of this episode seems vaguely familiar – much like the start of Mudd’s Women. We are chasing after a ship that isn’t answering and end up having to transport the crew to the ship after the ship ends up going critical. Only instead of a Con-man and three women we have a group of eccentrics, or space hippies if you prefer.
This episode tries too hard to make up slang for these group of people. Also makes them seem like a group of ten year olds.
Irina and Chekov remind me a little of Riker and Troi a little.
The ‘space hippies’ take over the ship and take it to their version of Eden. Their leader, Dr. Severin is insane, brought on by the fact that he is a carrier for an infection. (Season 3 is very big on contigious diseases. He leds them into Romulan space and down to a planet he considers to be “Eden”.
Except everything, including the grass, has an high acid level. The air appears normal, and clothing seems to protect it but putting bare skin on anything or eating anything will cause burns and death.
Thankfully Kirk & Co get to the ‘space hippies’ before they are hurt with the exeption of Adam and Severin (who goes crazy and eats the acid pear. Do not eat the acid pear.
I have to agree with Walter Koenig that Chekov was a little out of character this episode. He is usually a generally happy, abit sarcastic guy who jokes with his coworkers. He is a lot more serious in this episode. Perhaps it has been the past season making him more serious, especially since he found himself pretty violent after alien encounters twice.
Interesting Notes:
- Directed by David Alexander
- Written by Arthur Heinemann and Michael Richards (D.C.Fontana)
- Walter Koenig felt this episode had his character out of character.
- This episode reuses a lot of footage from other episodes
Pros:
- The music is good, even if the lyrics are a little iffy.
Cons:
- Costumes are made of fragements again.
- Story is flat
- Ending is kind of ..rushed and doesn’t make sense. If everything is acid, wouldn’t the scanners on Enterprise figure that out? Why not the atmosphere??
Sokorra Lewis 