What. The hell. Was this? Quite easily my least favourite episode that I've seen. This mess didn't seem to know what it wanted to be, and forgot the basics of storytelling. I have no idea what they were going for or what was supposed to be happening. Most of the episode seemed to be people wandering aimlessly around. Did they not have access to the main cast for this week? Scotty spend the episode staring at a TV. How long did that damn rocket take to launch? Ugh.
The original Star Trek is full of these episodes: an Earth-like culture adapting exactly to some of our history but being tainted by outside interference. I don't enjoy them, it was as dull and unsurprising the first time as it was the tenth.
The 1960s view of how computers work is charmingly quaint. A tight and focused episode, but no real tension. I enjoyed how worked up Kirk got.
Not much to enjoy here. The most typical of Star Trek ingredients mixed together: primitive culture representing one from our past, human interference, pro-Americanism and a fight to the death. In this case it's all quite boring and mildly offensive.
That was a jumbled mess until the last heartbreaking 15 minutes.
Kind of enjoyable in its silliness. The highlight was definitely Scotty's drunken adventure, and I couldn't help but burst out laughing at Kirk's dirty leer when Kelinda asked him to "apologise" again.
There's no denying that this is a fun and fantastical episode that manages to discuss the horrors of fascism. But it becomes less engaging and ambitious as it progresses, and slogs its way to a muddled ending.
The "risk is our business" speech got me genuinely excited. Other than that, this was a clever and twisty episode with Leonard Nimoy giving quite a creepy, unhinged performance. Wouldn't it be great if every time you were having a conversation, you turned around there was Spock casually leaning against the doorway, making a sarcastic comment.
This felt like it was from a different show, a very non-Trek sort of vibe. Quite awful, too. Spock's tiny role was the best part of the whole thing.
I've got to admit, this just did not hold my attention and I lost track of what was going on. Some nice special effects from what I saw.
Very silly but quite fun. I really dislike the episodes that show a convenient Earth-like civilisation, but this one did it quite well.
A genuine example of "so bad it's good". This is a ridiculous over-the-top episode that I laughed most of the way through, but also found myself really getting into. Shatner is almost doing an impression of himself at times. The three brains are pure Futurama fodder. Really silly, really bad, really enjoyable.
A genuine classic, funny and fun. I could totally see Simon Pegg in Scotty's role here. Love that DS9 revisited this episode later in such a clever way.
"Gee, Jim, do you think Scotty's finally got over his hatred of women?
Scotty proceeds to murder three women.
Total silliness aside. this was quite a fun whodunit episode, and James Doohan was pretty great.
Shatner can't really pull off obsession, especially when compared to how well Patrick Stewart would do it later. Otherwise, an enjoyable but forgettable monster-of-the-week episode.
The first of what will be many "aging quickly" stories for Star Trek. This is a pretty fun one. I did find it quite silly that, after learning they have only a few hours to live, they go ahead with a lengthy hearing to decide who is in charge of the ship.
Quite an ambitious episode, but it felt like an ill-conceived story from the start. Just not interesting enough to keep my attention. It also reminded me more of typical 1990s Trek, but less polished. I was surprised at the fair amount of (relatively) violent deaths for a 1960s family TV show.
Parts of this took me right back to playing TIE Fighter.
Which reminds me, I need to replay TIE Fighter.
I love the introduction of Spock's parents and his relationship with them. It's genuine and added a great deal of heart, helped by the fact that I know some of the things from later in the franchise. The main plot of the episode itself is a bit all over the place, starting off well but losing its way as it went. It's nice that Kirk, Spock and especially McCoy all get to shine, though.
Wow, where to start? It's a sweet story about love, but the 1960s incredible sexist viewpoints are unbearable. The strong-willed female commissioner was overtaken by a being that just wanted a man to love her (and of course, "the concept of male and female is a constant throughout the galaxy"). Ugh. Redeemed somewhat by the ending. Zephram Cochrane was far more interesting in First Contact.
This was unexpectedly fun. I hated Mudd's previous appearance, but this pure comedy episode worked very well. It's great to see the characters acting so far outside of their usual roles.
Star Trek's Halloween episode is kind of awful. The spooky haunted house vibe should have been fun but it's all very silly. Some of the dialogue is funny, though, and the "giant" cat wandering through an obviously miniature set was a cheesy highlight.
Well, Commodore Decker was a bit of a maniac, wasn't he?
Loved the design of the planet killer, just a bit old crazy thing.
So, Kirk and crew encounter a primitive culture and decide they're doing things wrong. They kill their God and force their own values on these people's society. They then consider this a good day's work. I am deeply uncomfortable with that. Spock at least has the wherewithal to point out that they may not have done the right thing at the end, but his comrades literally laugh at him. Wow.
That aside, it's an entertaining enough episode, the earlier sections with the hazardous planet and crew deaths being the most exciting part. It also appears that Spock is virtually indestructible just due to the fact that he's Vulcan.
Nice to finally see the original Mirror Universe episode that kicked off a story arc reappearing throughout the franchise. I find the original Trek at its best when it's either super adventurous/dramatic or having crazy fun like this. Mirror, Mirror succeeds mostly, but I felt like it could have explored a bit more. The required scene in which Kirk has a female fawning all over him was so unnecessary, but at least evolved to an interesting conclusion.
Well, this is a moderately fun story. It seems to have been remade and redeveloped for Star Trek: The Motion Picture, the similarities are glaring. The episode is also a bit slow and it has a truly ridiculous series of events with Uhura that just... wow, I can't even begin to figure out what they were going for there. Some more horribly sexist stuff makes this an episode that will be easy to forget.
The word 'genius' is thrown about too casually these days. But, this episode is absolute genius.
Second episode has a very different tone to the first, I thought. It was a lot to take in and I think I enjoyed it a bit less, but still very engrossed. The two newcomers are obviously stand-ins for the two leads in the original film, though they've made their personalities very extreme (Ben Barnes is a monster).
LOVED that disorienting transition from the staging area to suddenly being on a moving train. What on Earth is going on there? Fascinating.
Thandie Newton's stuff was the most interesting, along with Delores' continuing story, though I really wanted to follow her more. The Man In Black's story was odd - I like it, but if he can't be hurt then there isn't much real tension in any of it. It's like he's being cruel just for the sake of it, and I don't see why it's at all necessary right now. Obviously, we need more of his story revealed. Ed Harris is great, anyway.
And as everyone else is saying, Sizemore the scriptwriter is just... appalling. How did this guy get cast? Is it intentional? It's utterly horrendous acting and dialogue. Is it going to turn out that he's a robot that they're trying to teach emotions to? Similarly, I'm not amazed by the female administrator either, and the reveal that she's sleeping with the engineer felt a bit soap opera-esque.
Great use of 'No Surprises'.
I pretty much loved this. It's taken the general setup of the movie but is completely doing its own thing with it and going in a very different direction. A lot of unexpected things being turned on their head. The actors playing the hosts are fantastic (notably, Delores and her father). I loved the way their accents changed. The scene with Hopkins and the father speaking creeped me out, and meanwhile Ed Harris is terrifying.
The music was also wonderful throughout and added a lot. Wonderful use of Black Hole Sun and Paint It, Black. My only disappointments were the English administrator and his boss, they were poorly written and frankly poorly acted scenes that didn't flow well with the rest of the episode.
At this point, I also don't have much idea where things are going. That's not a problem, as the episode sucked me in and I really want to continue. The final shot was excellent and the whole thing looks incredible.
Despite some good stuff, this season was a real chore to get through and sloppy in so many way. It was full of incredible moments - most of them featuring the Punisher or Karen - but overall nothing was very cohesive. Elektra was just awful, not only a poor casting choice but mostly her writing was of such a lower quality than everything else. Additionally, she reduced the characters around her by association. The random faceless ninja army was incredibly lazy and painfully dull to watch. As wonderfully choreographed all the fight scenes are, they begin to feel very repetitive and the enemies are just cannon fodder that you can't care about.
But we also had Frank Castle, who was just a powerhouse but made all of the other plot lines uninteresting by comparison. I adored the scene between him and Karen in the diner. The violence and gore levels were stepped up big time and had an impact, earning this season the 18 certificate. In that respect, there is no way these Netflix series can ever mesh with the movies, the tones are just so different that these would have to pull back massively.
Karen emerged as the most watchable character for me. The court trial was gripping, and her investigation and emerging confidence was fascinating, although her sudden transformation into a journalist didn't ring true for a second. I feel like episodes are being written by different people pulling in different directions. Fisk should have been a great return for the character, but he only came across as immature and the performance was peculiar.
The season was also too long, it just dragged in so many places. The Yakuza/Black Sky rubbish was dull. I cheered when Elektra was killed off, but those final shots of her apparent resurrection have killed my appetite for more.
