Shore Leave

This episode reminds me of the Sta-Puft Marshmallow Man sequence from the end of Ghostbusters. Except of course that the Ghostbusters thing made sense. If you know that something evil is going to take the form of whatever you happen to be thinking about, it’s logical to try thinking about something harmless. On the other hand, the makes-your-fantasies-real planet here reveals something about the Enterprise crew: these folks have some genuinely bizarre things on their minds.

The beginning is believable enough. In a desperate search for a good spot for some R&R for the crew, an away team of the usual suspects beams down to an apparently-uninhabited planet to inspect and make sure it’s safe for at least a couple of days of fresh air and sunshine. The first indication of something amiss is when McCoy sees a giant white rabbit being pursued by a young girl, which is odd because he was just thinking about Alice in Wonderland. Now, why the ship’s doctor would be thinking about Alice in Wonderland is a question best left for another day, as it’s scarcely the strangest thought anyone on this show has. Ditto with one of the women, whose fantasy about Don Juan turns into a 60s-TV-chaste sexual assault.

In short order it becomes obvious that whatever pops into people’s heads becomes real. Kirk even gets a double dose: an old girlfriend and a bully from his days as a cadet at Star Fleet Academy, both exactly how he remembered them and not a day older. I guess I can understand why a guy like Kirk would fantasize about sparking an old flame and wrasslin’ with an old enemy. But why would someone as smart as Sulu think, “Gee, it sure would be fun to be attacked by a samurai and not even get a sword of my own so I can fight back.” And don’t even get me started on the folks who conjure assaults by tigers and World War Two fighter planes.

In the end an old guy in a Slanket emerges from the bushes and reveals that the whole planet is an elaborate amusement park. The crew would be having more fun, he observes, if they’d focus their thoughts a little better. And as if to prove his point, out comes McCoy – who was temporarily killed by a Black Knight while trying to prove said knight was a figment of his imagination – with a couple of feather-draped showgirls on either arm.

I believe this is the first installment in the series that features any significant location work, and the crew’s inexperience with the great outdoors shows up in several shots. The lighting in particular is hit-and-miss, with a few fairly spectacular misses. Otherwise, however, this is a solid middle-of-the-road episode.

Episode rating:

Stardate: 3025.3

Episode type: Enterprise crew

Written by: Theodore Sturgeon

Original air date: December 29, 1966.

Balance of Terror / The Galileo Seven

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