3.1 — “Spock’s Brain”

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4 responses to “3.1 — “Spock’s Brain””

1. 

   Randi Cohen

   February 24, 2014

   Well, I liked it… sort of.

   Worst thing about the episode is its title.  I think if you called it pretty much anything else (“devolution”, “those whom gods destroy”, “all the pretty little horses”, whatever) it would gain a point just from that.  Too bad b/c third season has pretty great titles other than this.

   In defense of the sexism here, I think it is mainly confined to the male banter about the “delights” under the surface.  Honestly, the males on the planet are just as intelligence-deficient and primitive as the females, and once the leader puts on the brain helmet she is actually quite fierce and competent.  And the whole parallel devolution idea is not a terrible one.  It was done quite well in the “time machine”.  So personally I am okay with this episode, if we could just remove all references to “brain” (which makes most things inherently silly, it’s just a silly word) and if we skipped the last 10 minutes entirely, or at least the part where bones suddenly loses all knowledge of brain surgery then is coached through it by the patient (!).  Replace those with actually letting Spock go on for longer analysing the situation (and really, if your friend is miraculously brought back from the dead, is your first move to interrupt and laugh at him??  come on.)   That analysis was the most interesting part for me and could have had potential to fill out some of the interesting questions this episode raises.  Such as how exactly did this devolving start taking place?  What separated the men and the women?  How did the idea start of creating the knowledge helmet?  And, why not use one of their own brains to run the system?

   Also, they are not killing Spock in any real sense, and he is providing life support and probably preventing numerous deaths… so would it not honestly make sense to leave him there to guide the natives on a path toward independence?  Spock would probably be willing to do it too.  If he had a moral dilemma about returning to his body and Kirk had to convince him, that would have been a much more interesting end to the episode.

   Yes, other things also make little sense in this episode, but that has been true in many episodes prior, and to me it is forgivable if it makes an interesting point.  Which it doesn’t, but it is actually so close to doing!  Maybe Gene just needed to rewrite it a bit…

   2 out of 5  purple go-go boots, for its potential.

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2. 

   Kevin Black

   February 24, 2014

   The dialogue was pretty terrible. Kirk and the women below the surface basically are talking baby talk to each other, with Bones bailing Kirk out every so often to explain that this line of conversation is probably unprofitable. Good point that the male character on the surface does not come off any better/more realistically, although at least he is not on screen as long.

   How does the species reproduce if the males and females rarely interact? Presumably the central brain arranges for this somehow?

   I also thought that Spock might want to stay on the planet “needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few” grounds. The reasons for not doing so are mostly sensualist reasons that he is not suppposed to be enthralled by (also an interesting thing to explore, if they had done it). Which also raises qustions about why they need a brain in the first place, why it has to be Spock’s brain, and why this is all becomes moot once they receive a 60 second lecture from Kirk about the virtues of making their own way in the world.

   I did like the purple go-go boots, however.

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3. 

   R. Alex Reutter

   March 2, 2014

   It’s SEASON THREE!

   LOOK!  The title text is blue!

   SEE! Scotty’s new hairdo!  It’s… awful.

   WATCH!  Spock in a hairnet and worse than dead!  As mentioned, the whole “they stole Spock’s brain” is ridiculous.

   Uhura is asking the right question.  Why did they take Spock’s brain?  

   Nice touch with Kirk saying “Mr. Spock — Mr. Scott” when they beam down and start to take readings.

   “Those women could never have set up a system like this.”  Hoo, boy.  We’re still in the 60’s.  

   So… I agree with Randi that there’s actually an interesting premise in here, but it’s buried.  Too bad.

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4. 

   Kevin Black

   March 2, 2014

   Scotty’s new hairdo bugs me, too. It seems very Italian, for a Canadian playing a Scot.

   One of the things that bothers me about “Spock’s Brain” is that there are so many episodes, especially in first season, where Kirk feels keenly the burden of commanding followers who may die in any number of ways (remember “Balance of Terror?”).This episode is like, “Oh, someone stole our First Officer’s brain? We’ll just fly across the galaxy and find it again, and he’ll be good as new! La, la, la, la.”

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