ST: Halloween episode

Tonight's episode is The Return of the Archons, and, judging from the teaser appended to the end of the previous episode, it looks like the Halloween episode. More mysticism than science and investigations of strange doings on a weird planet. Okay, to start, Sulu and "O'Neill" are being chased through an old town set by Grim Reaper lookalikes. Sulu is touched and his mind altered and the extra runs off. So we're already off to a good mysterious start.

So they're looking for remnants of a starship (Archon) that disappeared 100 years ago. The costume designer apparently couldn't decide if it was the old west or colonial America.

So the "red hour" arrives and a riot breaks out. The rocks appear to be rubber balls as one bounces off someone's head about 6 feet into the air and he suffers no ill-effects.

Someone named "Landru" appears to be revered like a god and their ignorance of him and the "festival" causes suspicion.

The reapers show up again, shoot a sparkler at one of the natives and he dies, apparently. That special effect probably cost about 10 cents.

Apparently being stunned by a phaser gives you enough time and presence of mind to lay yourself gently on the ground.

Landru is clearly from the future. His hairdresser is the same as the 80's New Wave bands.

It's a morality tale about the value of individuality despite the problems that can arise from it.

This has happened for several episodes, Kirk keeps making log entries at times when he's not able to actually make log entries. And if they're done after the fact, why doesn't he use the past tense?

Bones and an extra have been altered now too and Kirk descends into emotional outbursts in an attempt to bring him to himself. There's a reason Spock was everyone's favourite; he was the only one who had any sense at all.

Spock's mindmeld doesn't even work. The extras demand action, regardless of what it is and Spock has to remind everyone that you can't just bang your head against the wall.

They haul off Kirk and Spock for their re-education. And then it turns out that the re-educator is part of the conspiracy and Kirk and Spock and left unchanged and given their weapons back.

So the working hypothesis now is that Landru is merely a front for the computer-controlled society.

Aaaaand... they're right.

Now they're going to catch it in some sort of logic paradox and make it overload. Super Asimov ending cliché! The computer is anthropomorphised out of all similarity to an actual machine.