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Episode
04
Where No Man Has Gone Before
(Re)Meet the crew of the Enterprise, and meet a couple of people who are quick to develop a God complex! The third broadcast episode and second Star Trek pilot is the subject of the fourth episode of this week’s Mission Log!
Just what is going on here ?
Not sure, but it looks like Kirk and his date just got back from a trip to Radio Shack.
Radio Shack could only hope !
She is so adorable. Yeoman Smith.. Jones?
I’ll bet there WAS a Yeoman Smith-Jones somewhere!
Lou
There were alternative scenes to this – Trek’s second pilot. They can be seen on the Blu-ray set or you can watch those clips here
Behind the scenes pic used as Magazine cover
Thank goodness the colors got switched.
Spock doesn’t seem to have his greenish yellow makeup on in this pic. What a lot of light they had to use!! I remember our home movie camera in the 60’s having a bank of like six huge light bulbs. My dad never got indoor shots of anything put people squinting and holding up their hands to the burning light.
Awesome share – love the alternate and outtakes. Thanks!
These are great, thanx for sharing all this awesome stuff!
My pleasure.
Pooh! Blocked by CBS CID (Central Intelligence Division?) I have the blue ray set, fortunately…
You know, I always considered The Great Barrier to be constructed and not a naturally occurring phenomenon. In my mind, both this one and the one at the center of the galaxy were made by The Preservers millions of years ago for reasons unknown. I equate them to the “Slow Zones” in Vernor Vinge’s A Fire Upon The Deep. I think they were constructed to keep something out of our galaxy, something dangerous in order to let there humanoid experiment (as described in TNG’s The Chase) to flourish without interference. Makes one kind of wonder what’s going on in that Andromeda Galaxy next door.
That’s an interesting explanation of it. I always thought it was a bit arbitrary. I keep getting the Preservers and the Providers from Triskelion mixed up. Or maybe they are the same…. ! Are three brains betting on everything we do?
For me the big significance is in that little view screen bio you showed of Dr. Dehner. Her research and thesis into “esper-oriented beings” suggests that the Federation was a bit worried about this whole ESP thing. Even though the Vulcans are clearly a little “esper-oriented” (or maybe because of that), they are worried about this kind of “weapon.” The theme runs through the whole show. Look for all the “esper-oriented beings” and how Kirk reacts to them. Telepathy and telekinesis are often feared and shown to be extremely dangerous to humans. From a series continuity point of view (which I know isn’t fair) I do think the Federation would have been all over the Barrier as soon as this incident was reported on Kirk’s log. They would want to know why it had the effect it did. And does it enhance your esper-powers when you go “out” or only when you come back “in” the Galaxy? Another interesting point for me is to consider that the Enterprise must have travelled laterally through the galactic disc to get to the “edge” not out to the furthest star on its circumference. That might explain how Delta Vega seems so close to the edge.
Great insight on Dehner, etc! I’ll have to look back at that.
Publicity still https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/72e7ff2aa109c5b18e4f023b8866644dda3ce396e4013c61f9775c165bd96575.jpg
I have to say I was a little disappointed with some of the discussion this time around. You kind of went straight to “isn’t it strange that nearly everyone thought they’d have to kill someone with super powers” rather than asking the question, why? I think the answer is obvious: Kirk and Spock knew Gary very well. Sure there was probably a back story of dangerous experiences with people gaining powers as James W. Maertens noted below. And the point of a person not having “earned” such power, as you say, is well taken. That theme shows up again and again in Trek. But Kirk and Spock clearly knew what kind of a man Mitchell would become when he had nothing to restrain him.
I also think it’s interesting that you note briefly (almost dismissively) that in the future people will have gotten past religion. Yet here and a couple other times Kirk makes it clear that he has very specific ideas about God (at least about godhood in this case). “Does that make him a god or does it make him something else?” i.e. a devil. “Above all else a god needs compassion.” And in just a couple episodes we’ll see the Enterprise has a chapel.
OK here is my first (?) of several questions after blazing through most of the first season podcasts.
HOW did Gary Mitchell die?
I say this because as strong as he became, invulnerable to phasers, that a rock falling on him wouldn’t have hurt him, let alone killed him.
I don’t see it.
No rush, John. (I expect to finish the first season some time next week.)
Lou
Yeah, but it seemed Dehner had sufficiently weakened him – his powers were fading in and out. He lands in the open grave with the tombstone on top of him then a perfectly-shaped rock to fill up that hole (and presumably squish Mitchell).
A good theory sir, and better than most.
(I worry that I am not getting alerts to responses on my comments, and I now have to revisit them to check. Shouldn’t we automatically get alerts? I assume YOU guys do…?)
BTW, I have just completed your FIRST season podcasts.
I always found it odd that Kirk didn’t have a problem with Kelso rigging up a massive detonator – the guy who recently admitted that he’d missed noticing a clearly burnt out thingamagig on the Enterprise that would have blown up the ship had Gary not pointed it out.
Yeah – THAT’S the guy to have mucking around with big explosive planet-busting generators…
I was surprised that you didn’t also mention how Charlie X was also basically a god, and how was punished with exclusion by the aliens. This “infinite power” issues seems to be coming up a lot in TOS a lot!
Very true – they liked their running themes.
Is it me or did the (Mission Log, not Enterprise) computer voice sound a bit drunk in all of these old episodes?
It has cost us years of rehab. The computer doesn’t like to talk about it.