ST: Law and Order

Next up, Court Martial. It's like Law and Order and NCIS, but in space! I guess. I'm not sure about this episode either. Nifty, we open with several starships orbiting Earth? But they're on Starbase 11. Turns out the captain is going to have a court martial because one of his crewmen died. Spock turns up with the computer log and seems concerned. The dead man's kid then comes in and accuses him of hating her dad and murdering him and *shock* the computer log shows that Kirk jettisoned a pod (?) before the red alert. I was right, it will be Law and Order/NCIS... but in space!

Kirk is confined to the base pending the trial.

Looks like Kirk is suddenly a pariah. No one seems to have any doubt about anything.

Enter mysterious blonde woman into the bar. All this needs is a cameo by Bogart in a fedora and raincoat.

Kirk gives a deposition about how the dead man (Finney) had a grudge against him. Clearly, Finney has faked his death and is framing Kirk.

Now the Commodore insinuates that Kirk should just be shuffled off for the good of the service, but Kirk scorns him and demands the court martial.

Of course, if the computer says he's guilty, then no one will believe otherwise since computers are infallible.

Kirk meets the old girlfriend who... surprise! Works for the JAG office. She'll end up as the prosecutor. Ding! Ten points for me.

She suggests a lawyer (suspect him!) and skedaddles.

Never mind. The lawyer has a huge library and scorns the ability of computers to replicate the physical qualities of books.

Oh, man. It's obvious it's a frame-up. The "dead" man was the records officer. Who better to fiddle with the computer records?

Spock testifies. Another records officer testifies about Kirk's history with Finney. Kirk's lawyer hasn't cross-examined anyone yet. Not even Bones, who is an expert in "space-psychology". Now the court takes notice.

I've seen the actor who plays his lawyer somewhere else. He looks like the "gunsel" from The Maltese Falcon.

They tried to cut short the announcement of Kirk's awards and commendations, but Kirk's lawyer jumps all over that. Then he maintains that he did the right things in the right sequence and that the death was an unfortunate result, not that he panicked into error or deliberately killed Finney.

Now we get to see the tampered tape. The tape shows that Kirk at least didn't pick Finney, Spock did because he was top of the duty roster.

It is to laugh. The "magnification on the panel" shows a close up from another angle.

I'm betting that the control labels are switched around. Despite the fact that something like that should be obvious to anyone familiar with starship controls.

Win! 26 years later and I still recognized Elisha Cook Jr.

And the daughter now comes and urges Kirk to change his plea. Shady, she knows something. And now Spock finds evidence of the computer being tampered with.

A little ridiculousness between the lawyers. The defense lawyer makes an impassioned speech about the rights of men.

It's a bit silly the way they're setting it up, but not that much worse than some Agatha Christie stories. They're going to go up to the Enterprise and "confront" the computer so Kirk can face all the witnesses against him.

Wow, they're really off the rails now. They're emptying the ship and only keeping the court and officers and a few bridge crew on the ship. They're going to find him by his heartbeat. Because there's still sound detected that's not from the bridge, they know he's on board.

They're banking on the fact that the crazy man won't want to kill his daughter along with the rest of them. I'm not sure I'd have bet on that.

Turns out that the sabotage to the ship was him plugging in some wires backwards. Seems like a pretty minor thing.

And we close by learning that Kirk loves 'em and leaves 'em and his lawyer will now defend Finney.

It could have ended a bit stronger, but not bad.