Maybe a potty emergency?
At one point, Spock overhears Lokai in the briefing room trying to gain allies among the Enterprise crew. Through the doors, we observe four crewmen seated around a table - Sulu and three NDs. As Spock listens, we hear Sulu ask a question. Then we hear Chekov make a comment. The problem is that Chekov is not in the room! Doh!
Wouldn't it be simpler to have the Captain's log a recording unit in his chair, rather than a separate piece of equipment?
Spock mentions that the entity in the stolen shuttlecraft might be suffocating. Rather than quickly beam him on board and THEN tractor the shuttlecraft in, they leave him on board the shuttlecraft. He could have been dead by the time the docking bay was closed and repressurized.
The Federation has never seen anyone like Lokai before, yet they recognize his term for his own planet.
Bele has been chasing Lokai for 50,000 years. Fifty THOUSAND years! (And just where have they been in all that time, that the Feds have never come across them before?) Yet, after 50,000 years, Bele can't wait a few days, or hours to get Lokai back to Cheron.
Lokai had stolen a shuttlecraft, yet Kirk never thought to put a guard on him or put him in the brig. When the ship changed course, Lokai just bounded out of Sickbay and no one tried to stop him.
I noticed during the self-destruct sequence, the computer repeated Kirk and Scotty's codes after they spoke them, but not Spock's.
Scott mentions, very casually, that the ship is circling around at Warp 10. Never says a word about the ship not ordinarily being capable of such a speed.
Bele announced that he was responsible for the burned-out mechanisms in the computer and said that he did them "Like this" and demonstrated. Why didn't anyone notice and stop him when he first did "this"?
How did Lokai and Bele both know how to use the transporter?
When they were doing their marathon jog around the ship, they only encountered three crewmembers. Where was everyone?
For an uncharted region of space, they sure got there quickly. They should have cut in a scene indicating the passage of a few days, at least.
In sickbay, Kirk tells Bele he has ordered guest quarters for Bele. Earlier in the episode, Bele beamed onto the Enterprise's bridge, after which Kirk accompanied Bele to Sickbay for a meeting with Lokai.
When did Kirk have an opportunity to give such an order? If he gave the order regarding guest quarters for Bele in the turbolift via the shipboard communications system on the way to sickbay, wouldn't Bele have already heard Kirk giving that order?
First a nit from the Classic Guide:
Phil refers to Cheron as changing colour from grey to red. it was actually Arianis which accomlished this.
Now a couple of nits from the episode itself:
Was the stolen shuttlecraft really the Galileo? If not, why is "NCC 1701/7" written on it?
Chekov disappears from the bridge when Bele`s ship is about to collide with the Enterprise.
GUEST STAR PATROL (Guest stars, people! Guest stars! Don't miss THE GUEST STARS!)
Frank Gorshin (Bele) was, as Phil pointed out, the Riddler on "Batman" for the first and third seasons. Gomez himself, John Astin filled the green tights for the second.
The first number in the ship's heading is 403? Well, I guess Starfleet has yet to adopt the 360 degree circle headings that they (allegedly) use in The Next Generation?
There is a problem with dusting the planet from orbit. Wouldn't the antibacterial agent just burn up in the atmosphere?
According to the Tech Manual, TOS uses a gradians system (400 units per circle). This still doesn't explain the 403 heading.
Note to Johnny - Arianis does change color, as a result of the decontamination. However, Cheron ALSO changes color, and this is simply a production error. All of the viewscreen shots approaching the planet show a gray world. But when
Kirk asks Bele where Lokai could go, Bele looks at the viewscreen, and a close-up of a red planet.
Kirk has a short memory. After he regains control of the ship he tells Bele and Lokai he should throw them both in the brig. He forgets that he did try to have them thrown in the brig just a little while earlier, and was unable to because of their force fields.
Anyone notice how in the "Next Voyage" trailer for this episode, the scenes from the self-destruct sequence were edited so the computers voice counts down from five to zero? Of course, in the episode, Kirk said that no command could stop the self-destruct sequence once it had gotten past the five-second mark.
Actually, Mike, John Astin played the "Puzzler", not the "Riddler".
No, Astin did play the "Riddler" as a replacement for Gorshin in one episode. The "Puzzler" was played by Maurice Evans.
It was two episodes, actually - the last two the The Riddler appeared in.
Ooops! My bad. I thought for sure Astin played the "Puzzler". Been a long, long, long time since I've seen the old Batman shows.
I sure like to know who the knuckleheads were at Starbase 4 that allowed Lokai to steal their shuttlecraft.
Where was security at that Starbase?
Didn't they have tractor beams?
Wasn't there a Starship nearby?
Wasn't there a Starship nearby?
My guess is that, once again, the Enterprise was "the only ship in the quadrant" *G*
To: ScottN
Ah, yes...that old problem again!
Here's one for everyone else now....
I think it would have made more sense if the writers had Bele's ship "cloaked" rather than "it's invisible".
(Not to mention "better")
RUMINATIONS....
This episode handles the African-American/ White American issue splendidly!
The episode had a MESSAGE for the 1960's....
Racism is ignorant and if it continues it'll lead to genocide!
Thsnks for explaining, it, John. I wasn't too clear from the episode itself.
That's the point...the message was so obvious, even a child could understand it....I know I did when I first saw it. My whole attitude changed. This message needs to be heard by children / teens today seeing there's so much bigotry between Caucasians and the other ethnic races.
Do you realize college students today PREFER segregation? That's a crying shame.
Martin Luther King Jr. Must be rolling in his grave right now.
I can accept that Bele's ship was made from some sort of material to render it visually invisible, but the Enterprise's sensors still register it, so such stealth technology is useful only against visual contact.
The problem arises when Bele's ship 'disintegrates' before hitting the Enterprise. Kirk has full magnification locked onto what Spock's sensors are registering (Bele's ship), so when it broke apart (for whatever reason that was!) debris from the INTERIOR of the ship should have been seen on the main view screen. The interior couldn't possibly be invisible, or else Bele wouldn't be able to fly the thing.
And I agree with with anyone that says, "Fifty thousand years! OOOoooooooookay, fine."
There are two fabulous bloopers from this episode (I have not seen them since a convention in 1976.) One is where Frank Gorshin is on the bridge and blows his line (I am Belly-No I'm not.) The second is as Bele is beaming down and Gorshin steps into a James Cagney impression.(You dirty rat.) We also get a rare shot in this episode from the point of view of inside the transporter chamber. Thank Al Francis, the director of photography for most of the third season, for that.
"The need to resort to force and violence has long since passed."
Really? That's why your ships are equipped with phasers and photon torpedoes and why you have been at war with every major power in the Quadrant at some point.
I just watched this episode on the sci-fi channel this morning. They cut out 90% of the self destruct sequence! Un-smegging-believable! (if I may borrow from another show.)
The footage of Cheron being destroyed at the end of the episode, looks a great deal like the fire brigades footage of London or Plymouth during the Blitz. Strange that.
Why not? Both Bele & Lokai were acting like Nazis.
(Prejudiced & hateful) A "hidden" message, maybe?
I saw this episode on SCI-FI Channel last week, and they cut a lot out of the self-destruct sequence.
What is this? The syndicated SYNDICATED version?
When Lokai is lying in sickbay, Spock mentions that he is likely a mutation, because skin colors normally run a spectrum "from white to yellow to brown to black." But what about green Orions or blue Andorians?
I don't think he was listing "all possible colors," Bela. He was speaking in shorthand.
Meanwhile, Inspector Javert from Les Miserables was heard saying, "Give it up, man, get over it!"
I really had a hard time believing that Bele was chasing Lokai for 50,000 years. Who came up with this figure and why?
Just wait until Ted Turner goes a couple of rounds with them
Why all the fuss over Lokai’s black and white skin color in sickbay? Look at all the other aliens the Enterprise has encountered, both identical in appearance to humans, and totally non-humanoid or non-corporeal. What’s so unusual about the Cheronians?
I must’ve missed that massive group hug in Times Square at midnight on January 1, 2001.
When Lokai speaks with some of the crew members in the lounge, Sulu mentions that bigotry and racial prejudice was something he read about in the 20th century. When speaking so of a part of life that has died out, one usually refers to the last latest time period in which such an aspect existed before dying out. Given Sulu’s comment, this implies that racism will not prevail beyond the 20th century.
Well, I guess the explosion would shut off the "engaged" sign quite nicely.
Something about the auto-destruct sequence got me thinking. When the sequence is activated, a panel lights up with the words "auto destruct engaged." When Kirk coerces Bele into rescinding control of the ship, Kirk deactivates the sequence, and the panel shuts off. I dunno, shouldn’t there be a correlating "auto destruct aborted" display, rather than just one that says the ship’s gonna blow, which shuts off when disengaged? I had a darkly humorous thought that the designers didn’t think anyone would abort the sequence after starting it, and wouldn’t need an "abort" display.
Why do I suspect Scotty was doing one of his voices again into Uhura’s ear recievier?
When Uhura gives the news to Kirk, Spock and Bele that Starfleet has denied Bele’s request to extradite Lokai, the reasons cited include "intergalactic treaty" and "due process." First of all, this is the first contact between the Federation and Cheron, so they don’t have an extradition treaty with them, as Kirk told Bele earlier in the show. Second, the response by Starfleet also indicated that Lokai would eventually be extradited to Bele. Why is this?
Kirk must’ve given him schematics of the ship, much as he did Khan in Space Seed, in keeping with the "Give-a-dangerous-stranger-sensitive-plans-policy."
Given that this is the first meeting between Cheronians and the Federation, Bele and Lokai display a surprising amount of knowledge of it. After awakening in sickbay Lokai is told he is on the Enterprise, and he responds that he’s heard of it. Bele mentions the theory that humans were descended from apes. He sabotages two specific ship’s systems: directional control and self destruct. Lokai and Bele both operate the transporters at the end of the episode.
And if you watch any episode of Jerry Springer, you’ll see some of those ancestors
Also, I should point out that humans are apes, and that the theory is not that humans descended from apes, but that humans and modern apes descended from a common ancestor.
Psychologist: "And what do you see in this inkblot, Spock?"
Spock: "I see two societies that destroyed one another out of racial hatred for one another."
Psychologist: "I see…and what about this one?"
Spock: "The nuclear winter following a nuclear holocaust caused by mistrust between two great ------------------superpowers ."
Psychologist: "Interesting….and what about this one?"
Spock: "A massive riot caused by an incident of police brutality against an unarmed minority."
Psychologist: "Spock, it’s a photograph of three puppies in a basket!"
Spock: "You see what you see, I see what I see, Doctor."
Spock tells Lokai and Bele at the end of the episode that their people destroyed each other. It makes for a good plot twist, but how does he know this? True, he knows that it wasn’t a natural disaster, but how does he know one simply didn’t destroy the other? How does he know it wasn’t a different conflict unrelated to Cheron’s racism, like a war between two superpowers?
Must be the express turbolift
••••, those turbolifts are fast! After Lokai leaves the bridge at the end of the episode, Bele chases after him. From the point at which the turbolift door closes with Lokai in it, to when it opens again for Bele (both points occurring while the camera is on a close up of Spock and then Kirk) is 3 seconds! So the lift took Lokai to deck 3(where subsequent dialogue said he was), allowed him to get off, closed its doors, and returned to deck 1 in just 3 seconds?
The transporter operators must be union
Why is the transporter room empty at the end of this episode? Are the operators on a coffee break?
Let’s hope men have learned to stop and ask for directions by the 23rd century
How does the Enterprise get back to Federation space at the end of this episode without directional control?
Luigi noted: "Why all the fuss over Lokai’s black and white skin color in sickbay? Look at all the other aliens the Enterprise has encountered, both identical in appearance to humans, and totally non-humanoid or non-corporeal. What’s so unusual about the Cheronians?"
Bele "explains" the situation..."His people (Lokai's people) are black on the left side and my people (Bele's people) are black on the right side" Therefore, Lokai's people are "inferior"
(Not an exact quote mind you, but that's the gist of it.)
I have to agree Luigi, 50,000 years sounds a bit ambiguous...Bele may have been lying to sway Kirk's opinion.
Wasnt there a line in this episode where Spock claims that the Cheron skin tone must have resulted from inbreeding. That may have been what surprised Dr McCoy, the fact that this inbreeding had resulted in a divergence of black white or white black skin tone.
>Why is the transporter room empty at the end of this episode? Are the operators on a coffee break? <
Maybe a potty emergency?
There's a "blooper reel" to this episode in which Frank Gorshin steps onto the transporter pad and breaks into his James Cagney routine.
Margie, is there a need for the transporter room to be manned at all times? Ninety-five per-cent of the time, it is not in use. That said, it had been established that the transporter usually IS manned full time; Spock even said so in the first act of the premiere, "Man Trap" (Spock to Uhura-"The Transporter Room is very well manned and they will call me if necessary.")
John, were you at the New York cons in the seventies? (That would probably make you as old as I am, almost 47.) If so, I regret not meeting you there. The NYC con in February, 1976, was the last time I saw that blooper with Gorshin doing Cagney in the transporter room.
I remember seeing a video of bloopers on sale in the UK in the late 1990s. I presume this includes the above out-take as well as the many attempts to do the Tribble drop.
Does anyone have the tape of this ep? Can someone confirm or deny if the computer asks or waits for a 5 second password on self-destruct?
Thanks
It doesn't
A few years ago in a video catalogue they had a Star Trek Bloopers video. More than I wanted to spend, but such a tape was for sale in the US.
Scott, see the "Search for Spock" page for my (almost painfully) detailed answer.
>Margie, is there a need for the transporter room to be manned at all times? <
Adam, I wasn't the one who asked why it was empty. I was trying to make a joke about Luigi's question. notice the smiley at the end of my response.
OK, here's a transcription of the destruct scene, for those with any remaining questions (and just because it's cool).
Kirk: Computer, this is Captain James Kirk of the USS Enterprise... Destruct sequence 1, code 1, 1A.
Computer: Voice and code 11A verified and correct.
Sequence 1 complete.
Kirk: Mr. Spock?
Spock: This is Commander Spock, science officer... Destruct sequence number 2, code 1, 1A, 2B.
Computer: Voice and code 11A2B verified and correct. Sequence 2 complete.
Kirk: Mr. Scott?
Scott: This is Lieutenant Commander Scott, chief engineering officer of the USS Enterprise... Destruct sequence number 3, code 1B, 2B, 3.
Computer: Voice and code 1B2B3 verified and correct. Destruct sequence completed and engaged. Awaiting final code for 30-second countdown.
Kirk: Mr. Spock, has the ship returned to the course set for it by my orders?
Spock: Negative, Captain. We are still headed directly for Charon.
Computer: Destruct sequence engaged. Awaiting final code for 30-second countdown.
Kirk: Computer, this is Captain James Kirk of the USS Enterprise. Begin 30-second countdown. Code 000, destruct, 0.
Computer: Thirty seconds, 29, 28, 27 [commercial break], 25, 24, 23, 22, 21, 20 seconds...
Kirk: From 5 to 0, no command in the universe can prevent the computer from fulfilling its destruct orders.
Computer: 15 seconds.
Kirk: You can use your will to drag this ship to Charon, but I command the commander. Mine is the final command.
Computer: 10, 9, 8, 7, 6...
Bele: I AGREE!
Kirk: Computer. This is Captain James Kirk of the USS Enterprise. Code 1-2-3 continuity. Abort destruct order. Repeat, code 1-2-3 continuity. Abort destruct order.
Computer: Destruct order aborted. Destruct order aborted.
My problem with this is...Shouldn't the countdown have reached five by the time Kirk gives the order to abort?
Adam, anything can happen on a starship like the Enterprise at any given moment. They might detect or come across a ship about to explode, for example, and need to beam off the crew. They might be ambushed by an enemy vessel and need to use the transporters to either beam off the enemy after their ship has been disabled, or to beam a security team onto the enemy ship to arrest them. It just makes sense to have the transporter room manned at all times in case of any spur-of-the-moment emergencies.
Computer: Thirty seconds, 29, 28, 27 [commercial break], 25, 24, 23, 22, 21, 20 seconds...
Wow. A 1-second long commercial. Will wonders never cease. ;-)
Point well taken, Luigi, particularly since I don't recall escape pods ever being mentioned on the series.
Margie, I wanted at some point to discuss the manning of the transporter room, and that time seemed to be as good a time as any.
Thanks, Chronicler, for the play-by-play on the destruct sequence, one of my absolute favorite scenes in all Trek.
Any time, Mr. Bomb.
Incidentally, KAM, the TNN showings of the Trek movies have been HEAVILY padded with commercials, with Trek IV being the worst-a two hour film was padded to a running time of three hours with all the commercial breaks. At least they are running them mostly intact, even with that annoying black bar at the bottom.
You are most welcome, Mr. Chronicler. P.S. Is this ep on DVD yet? How far are they in the DVD releases? (This one may be for you, Mr. Lang.)
Sorry, I don't keep track of DVD news. I'll probably start once I have a computer or player that can handle DVDs.
Adam....Vol 31 & 32 are due out Aug 28..."Spock's Brain", "Is There In Truth No Beauty?", "The Empath" & "The Tholian Web"..."Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" would PROBABLY be out in Sept. or Oct. at this rate.
P.S....TOS DVD releases can be looked up on Amazon.Com
Oct. 23 y'all.
Bele's been chasing Lokai for 50,000 years. Fifty thousand years, people! That works out to 18,250,000 DAYS!!! (And you thought your work week has dragged on!). I have a real problem with that figure, and think it should have been substantially shorter, --even 500 years would have been excessive. Think about it; Bele is so incompeteent and Lokai is such a genius as escaping that they've been doing this since cavemen walked the Earth.
After 50,000 years, the Cheronians still managed to kill themselves off; it doesn't say much for their society as a whole if they could hold onto their hatred and racism for that long.
The shuttlecraft is from Starbase 4, but clearly marked as one from the Enterprise when we see it in the hangar deck.
Bele is a police officer of a sort; why didn't he simply hail the Enterprise, identify himself and then beam in?
His invisible ship simply disintegrates, but there's no explosion or debris to show it ever existed.
It must really bug Bele every time he looks in the mirror; his reflection shows him with the white side of his face on the other side, thus making his reflection look like the race he despises.
Whoa. The mirror Thing Will. That is really cool. You would think that if you looked into the mirror and saw a different race, that there wouldn't be the racism.
PREVIEW TRAILERS LIE!
I just saw the preview trailer for this episode on DVD Vol. 34....it shows the self-destruct countdown going all the way down to...ONE!!!!!!
KABOOM! Anyone?
*More great closeups of the Enterprise in this episode!
*The transformation of Arianus was done very well.
*I LOVE the closeups during the self-destruct sequence...it adds tension to the scene.
*The wideshots of the viewscreen are messed up again, sometimes Sulu is missing, sometimes Chekov is missing.
*Chapel's only line: "He's coming around, doctor" I'll bet Majel Barrett was thrilled to get her paycheck for that week.
*When Bele is seen running towards a red door, the footage comes from "Is There In Truth No Beauty?"
*Bele demonstates how he short-circuited (past tense) the directional control & the self-destruct...the problem is...when did he get the time to acomplish this?
Another great camera angle: The half-overhead shot of the drinking table in the lounge.
After Kirk cancels the self-destruct sequence, Bele returns the Enterprise back on course to Arianus. After they show the exterior of the ship, they take us back to the Bridge..HOWEVER... for some reason the entire ship is on RED ALERT! Who ordered this and when?
BTW...I counted a whopping THREE (that's 3) men in the hallway when Bele chases Lokai. Wow! And there's supposed to be over 400 people on the Enterprise! Where are they? Playing "Hide & Go Seek"?
Yeah, the revamped NCC-1701 corridors shown in 'Trials and Tribble-ations' did a much better job of indicating just how crowded those Enterprise corridors really would be.
Agreed, the self-destruct sequence is reallyreally cool. One maybe-nit though (from Chronicler's transcript, since I haven't studied the ep thoroughly): Kirk and Scotty both begin their commands with their full rank and posting, but Spock gets away with a quick 'Spock, science officer...'
So...are the other two just being excessively formal?
One aspect of this ep that kind of blunted the impact for me: When asked why he hates Lokai, the best Bele can come up with is his physical skin pattern (and, in Blish at least, some muttering about 'they can't rule themselves').
That's all?
Now, I do realize that's the point, to make racism sound irrational. But in real life, skin color isn't the reason behind race predjudice; it's only the cue for a whole set of personal assumptions based on that color.
In other words, Bele's been chasing this Lokai dude for fifty-ruddy-thousand-years [BTW, Luigi, love that 'Inspector Javert' line!]; he should have been rattling off vast reams of bile on the order of 'They're dirty, they're stu-pid, they can't hold down a job' or whatever's specific to the Cheronian experience.
Not, mind you, that I'm dying to hear this stuff (or that the creators probably could have gotten much of it on late-60's TV); but IMHO, the ep would have been even more powerful if it had treated the issue less simplistically.
Look carefully at Lokai running down the corridors...in one shot, he is holding a ROPE in his left hand (Viewer's right)
(The Compendium states it was a rope tied to a dolly of some kind to let Lou Antonio know how fast to run)
ALSO...take a VERY CLOSE look at Bele when he leaves Sick Bay...you can see part of his BARE HAND...and guess what....IT'S NEITHER BLACK NOR WHITE! It's a peach toned color...like a normal Caucasian!!!!
There's also a blooper reel in which Lokai & Bele smash into each other in the hall during the chase scene. (OUCH!)
I remember seeing that a looong time ago, but can't remember where. It was the third season blooper reel, which I've never seen in it's entireity. Have you seen the whole thing, John?
Better yet, do you know where WE can see it?
I can't remember if I saw it on a "Star Trek" special on TV or it was on a blooper video tape showing different bloopers from random shows...one of them was "Star Trek"
I remember seeing it on a late night tv series called Night Flight which ran on a local low powered station. They ran them a mixed up as they had the Uhuara "Mr Spcok Sugah" one as well as one where Nimoy was in the Command Chair looking all commanding and a kid with the pointed ears walked in and said hi dad! among a few others.
There are apparently are two time settings for the self-destruct sequence....
in this episode, Kirk sets the timer for 30 seconds...
In STIII, Kirk sets the timer for 60 seconds.
The close up of a finger pressing the button during the decontamination sequence comes from "The Doomsday Machine" when Kirk activates the 30 second detonation device.
The program staff at Sci-Fi should be flogged, or better yet, assimilated by the Borg. They hacked out Spock's and Scotty's parts of the destruct sequence, a big No-No in my book. I almost threw up when I saw that. What a hack job. WPIX ran edited versions of the episodes for years, but this sequence was never touched.
How did Sulu know the shuttlecraft came from Starbase 4?
For some oddball reason, Kirk decides to take "the scenic route" to look at Bele when he shows up. What I mean is, Kirk could've simply spun 15 degrees to his left and saw Bele sooner...but Kirk chose to spin his chair 45 degrees to the right to see Bele. Maybe Kirk wanted to take a "quick look" at Uhura first?
What I noticed today when watching the episode is that when Lokai leaves the bridge at the end, he takes a turbolift. Right on his heals is Bele, who also takes a turbolift. So does another turbolift drop in immediately? If so, how does Bele know where to stop the second turbolift?
Then, Spock is reading ship censors for the chase. Then he says, "There is someone materializing on the planet. It's Lokai." So internal sensors and planetary sensors are registering at the same time? (By the way, I would love a peak in that thing).
Finally, when someone asks Kirk if they should send security after them, he shrugs it off. Why? If those two fight, it could do some serious damage to the ship.
The way it ended was superb. Although a downer, it showed the true plight, strength, and futility of racism.
A nit in Bele's hands exists when he short circuits the directional control & the self-destruct...he starts out by using TWO HANDS, then after the "commerical", he is using only ONE HAND
GADZOOKS! Kirk has MAGIC Security guards...
When Bele takes control of the ship for the first time, he orders the security guards to arrest them. The problem is: They weren't there when Kirk & the others came out of the Turbolift...at least...as far as I could see. THEN after the Security guards fire their hand phasers at them, the guards vanish into thin air. No sign of them whatsoever.
The Conference Room in which Bele, Kirk & Spock talk, is a redress of the Chapel. You can see the red platform behind Bele.(Minus podium)
I believe this episode marks the last time we see the Shuttlecraft Bay Area. Also, the final appearance of the Shuttlecraft.
What about "The Way To Eden"? A shuttlecraft appears there.
A rare mistake on my part. I was just going to post my error today. Ya' beat me to the punch.
Wasn't the Chapel itself a redress of the transporter room (this was according to the book Making of Star Trek) or the Briefing Room?
Frank Gorshin is currently portraying the late George Burns in a new one-man show on Broadway titled Say Goodnight Gracie. The show is in previews; its official opening is 10/10/02.
Frank Gorshin is currently portraying the late George Burns in a new one-man show on Broadway titled Say Goodnight Gracie.
"Riddle me this, caped crumb-bums! How does Gracie say 'Good Night'?"
ADAM: I believe you're right about the Chapel being the redress of the Transporter Room. Good catch.
For some reason, during the scene where Bele's ship is detected, they show us the viewscreen and the red alert light is flashing on the helm / navigator station. However, the ship is NOT on Red Alert yet. (The scene cuts away to Kirk & the Red Alert light behind him is not flashing)
E.S.P. Red Alert?
Not sure if this was in the book, but after Spock overhears Sulu and the others discussing racism, he turns and walks down a hallway, at the end of which, the light patterns show what looks sort of like a Swastika.
Sir Rhosis
JUICY NIT!
When Bele comes on board, he asks to see Lokai. Kirk agrees & asks Spock to join him. HOWEVER..Spock DOES NOT ENTER with Kirk in Sickbay!--HE IS NOWHERE TO BE SEEN! What happened? Where did Spock go? Spock is not seen again until he returns with Kirk in the Turbolift on the Bridge!
POSSIBLE CONTINUITY ERROR: Before Bele leaves the Bridge to chase after Lokai (who's on his way to Cheron), Kirk is FACING TOWARD the Turbolift with Bele standing in front of it and asks, "Where Can he (Lokai) go?" Bele then leaves. Uhura then asks, "Do you want me to alert Security"? Kirk replies, "No. Where can they go?" The problem is, Kirk is now FACING AWAY from the Turbolift. Granted, there is time for Kirk to do an "about face", it just looks funny!
He grabbed his book (How to deal deal with illogical humans), and took a restroom break.
How come the internal sensors didn't pick up Bele's life readings when he was "deposited" aboard?
Bele had time to be "deposited" and say "Right here, Captain" before the alarm went off! *
(*= The Red Alert eventually DID go off AFTER the "commercial"...by that time Kirk could've been dead!)
Scratch that. The red alert was on just before the collision of Bele's "invisible" ship. However, what Spock should have said was, "It has deposited someone on the Bridge" instead of allowing Bele to announce that he was on the Bridge. Spock is usually more precise than shown here. (Probably his brain wasn't hooked up right)
MOVIE QUALITY MOMENT: I made a note earlier about the great shots of the Enterprise. One shot, in my opinion, deserves some "extra praise". It occurs when they show the title of the episode. The camera zooms in REAL TIGHT on the lower part of the saucer section...right up to the lower dome. This shot would be repeated again in STTMP & STII-TWOK when the Enterprise leaves Dry Dock.
Good Kirk Moment: I like Shatner's perf here, and his much imitated style of speaking ("I....WILL....destroy it!") works to the episode's advantage.
At the close of Act III, we see a tracking shot, showing the faces of Kirk, Spock, Chekov and Uhura watching Bele zap out the science panel. Then we cut back to the panel being zapped. The act ends with a close-up of Kirk. Was this Shatner's ego in full play, demanding the act end that way, with his face, instead of ending it with either a shot of the four people mentioned above, or the shot of the panel being fried? (Can I write run-on sentences or what?)
Can anyone tell who the two secuirty guards are?
The one of them looks like Mr. Leslie. If that's so, that gives us another Leslie Alert!
Can't tell, John. Don't blink, or even mention it, or Sci-Fi will edit the scene out.
This ep has one of maybe a few (if not the only) female security officer in the series. She was standing there when Kirk, Spock and Bele were discussing the gravity of Lokai's crimes.
Interesting Note
Frank Gorshin will be in Chicago for awhile. He'll be portraying George Burns in a stage play called: "Say Goodnight, Gracie"
In another blooper reel, Frank Gorshin mispronounces his character's name....he says: "I am BELLY....no, wait...that's not right." LOL!
Apparently Bele wasn't listening very well. Starfleet's message to Bele (relayed by Uhura) stated that "after a hearing, Commissioner Bele may retain his prisioner..." (or something similar to that)..and Bele cries "foul" by claiming that Starfleet "took Lokai's side".
...And what's the hurry to get to Cheron? Would a layover at Starbase 4 for a hearing and stating Cheron's problem make any difference in Bele's 50,000 year quest to chase Lokai?
still at it, eh John?
I think Bele's concern was that Lokai would escape again.
Jonnyvee...if you mean finding new nits in TOS...then the answer is "Yes".
Pizza, beer, a vcr, and Trek.
Life is good!
In my case, it's pizza, Mountain Dew, A DVD player (with stereo surround sound) and Trek.
Life is VERY good! 
Hey, John, it sounds like you've got a lot of the Trek episodes on DVD-- are you going to buy the full season sets?
Nope. I'm content with my multi-disc collection.
Spock excuses himself from sickbay, saying that he was going to conduct further research regarding Lokai's race. However, Chapel says that Lokai is waking up, then you hear the door in sickbay opening. Why wouldn't Spock return to the examination table and listen to what Lokai had to say? Why do unnecessary research, when for all they knew Lokai was going to be honest about stealing the shuttle?
Lokai mentions in the lounge to Sulu and the others about his people being taken from their homes to fight a war on another planet. This got me thinking about the ending. Now, I realize that the intention of the writer was to show that the Cheronian's prejudice killed them, but it could just as easily have been this unnamed alien world that decimated the population of Cheron.
There's no reason to believe that what Bele and Lokai are wearing are Cheronian clothing, or that Bele's invisible ship was Cheronian. 50,000 years of wearing the same thing? 50,000 years flying the same ship? Naw, I don't buy it. So the question is, who else, other than the Romulans, invented an invisible ship?
And speaking of the invisible ship, shouldn't the main screen be able to display an infrared or similar image? The sensors say there's a ship out there, so shouldn't the computer create a graphic image of it? Just because human eyes can't see it, doesn't mean the computer couldn't create a silhouette image of it.
Somehow, Bele was able to transport through the Enterprise's shields. I'd be a little concerned about that technology falling in the wrong hands!
Bele says "For 50,000 of your terrestrial years...". Did he get ahold of an astronomy book and work out that Earth's year is 365 days long and worked out the math to arrive at 50,000 years? Different planets have different year lengths, and for all we know Vulcan has 500 days in it's year, which wouldn't add up to 50,000 years.