Even more a shame: You could leave those last three words out and it would ring at least as true. Uhura is a character not held back by limited writing, but struggling through it.
And people say Vulcans don't have a sense of humor. They absolutely do, it's just so dry and snarky most humans rarely even catch on. Spock here is actually laying it on a bit thick by Vulcan standards. 🤨
The early episodes establish quite a lot more about Sulu than we usually give them credit for. The first episode to air, "The Man Trap", shows Sulu's passion for botany, particularly for hand-puppet-based flora, which Reilly mentions here and pops up again here and there in later episodes. Mostly, though, we learn that Sulu is something of a serial hobbiest: botany, fencing, firearms, aviation. Basically a proto-Tom Paris minus the story hooks. Anyhow, I'd like to think that they could/should have just gone with Botany Sulu instead of Fencing Sulu here, with him menacing crew members with a pair of pruning shears in the corridors and threatening Uhuru with a bag of potting soil on the bridge. He can still go shirtless, but a big floppy sun hat would be just as iconic.
Abrams took it to samurai, which is an inherent stereotype. I think George might have been confronted with that same stereotype and asked for fencing instead. It seems like it was more forward thinking in TOS. As a Japanese American, he had already been typecast in Midway. I am thinking he was over it.
I still don't know how they didn't make Kevin Riley a more regular character. Even when he's not zonked out on the space cooties, he's a joy to watch. Love that guy.
The second Riley appearance wasn't even planned. After he was cast for the role in "Conscience of the King," they changed the name of the script's one-shot character to Riley.
Yeah. I also think SOMETHING could have been made in future episodes of the bond Kirk and he should have as survivors of that failed colony. Is it possible Chekov was already in the works so they didn't need two "young" characters? Also Possum, good having you back. You single handedly showed me how powerful the word "Goofball" could be. Stay healthy Possum.
Funny how McCoy gives others a hypospray through their uniform sleeve, but for Kirk he rips his sleeve…one of many times Kirk has his uniform ripped, which is hilariously lampshaded in Galaxy Quest
Sulu slicked up with sweat and shirtless and that "sorry, neither" from Uhura... this is my favorite TOS episode by far. And then Kirk stupidly thinking that any fight with Spock could ever go his way, even before the cooties take effect? And I can only imagine the set dressers trying to clean up all the tooth marks left after Schattner and Nimoy retired breathlessly to their trailers. *chef's kiss*
Sulu is, by far, my favorite character from TOS. I got to meet him at a convention in 1986. I was wearing a "Don't call me tiny" button and was treated to his amazing laugh when he noticed it. Everything about George Takei is a joy.
I always found it fascinating that the very first thing they did with TNG (after the establishing intro episodes) was to copy this episode with extra horny.
Fascinating? The first season of TNG was awful, with the only halfway decent episodes being either direct rip-offs of TOS (The Naked *Now*? ffs!) or vaguly disguised rip-offs of TOS. Out of the whole seven seasons there were a score - maybe - of decent episodes. IMO of course...
Best description ever of what happens when Shatner was let off the the leash. All the ham. And yeah; Nichelle Nichols apparently improvised that line (citation needed but i think i heard her say it), and was a bit worried it wouldnt get past the censors... but it sure did, and world is better for it
♫♪...The helmsmen here in Starfleet bring lethal things aboard. You give a simple order, they stab you with a sword Oh, I don't want no more of Starfleet life...♪♫
5:22 I don't see how Kirk and Spock AREN'T infected after grappling with Sulu. If one touch is all it takes struggling with a half naked man should be more than enough for you to get the infection. And so when Spock goes to see nurse Chapel he's already starting to show the signs of the infection. This to me makes more sense than him becoming infected by Chapel and immediately start showing signs of it. Later when Kirk visits Spock He's been infected by again grappling with Sulu and now starts to show the effects. This makes more sense than both characters becoming instantly affected when everyone else took time to show symptoms. But hey what do I know I've only seen this about a dozen times since it first aired.
I remember reading in one of Nimoy's books, that since he was kind of a method actor, that scene was very cathartic for him. Since he would stay bottled up all day on set, and often still when he got home, getting to let his emotions out was a great release.
If I recall, George Takei suggested adding that extra line from Spock to clarify that Sulu's swordsmanship isn't in reference to samurais etc, but more specific to Errol Flynn's Robin Hood-type action, of which George Takei was a big fan as a kid.
Since George Takei was 5 when his family was forced into an internment camp, I'm thinking he saw those movies when they got out. Kind of weird to think that at the same time James Doohan was serving in the army.
it indeed is one of the best TOS episodes, and George Takei still does not get enough credit. I remember watching this in a re-run in the mid-90s. It was this episode when I noticed, Star Trek has this kind of silliness or pulp which can work out. And, George Takei seemingly had the time of his life.
Let me just say that I watched "Classic" Star Trek when there wasn't any other Star Trek. I thought this was one of the best episodes I had seen so far, and I'm sure you would have agree with my 12 year old self. I had already fallen hard for Spock, he was up there with Illya Kuryakin in my heart. But this story really allowed us to see how a good story didn't need expansive sets.
In "To the Stars" Takei discusses the process of his "swashbuckler" time; including (if memory serves) learning to fake it with a foil practically overnight - after having assured the production team: "Of COURSE I can fence, no problem!" BTW: In discussing how "slow" the pacing of TOS episodes might be, methinks we should remember that this pacing was pretty standard at the time for ALL shows. Even the earliest Bond movies with Sean Connery, from the same 1960s era, are much slower-paced than more recent films. If memory serves, there was a sea-change in general video pacing when "Laugh-In" came along; the first special before it became a series was so fast-paced for the time that some viewers claimed to be motion-sick. After a while, everyone else started to catch up.
An earlier draft of the script was apparently intended to have them time travel back three hundred years in order to lead into the episode "Tomorrow is Yesterday".
Still season one and boy howdy is this a DEFINING episode on multiple levels, for the characters and the TOS era of the franchise as a whole. And since it's season one, from sets, lightingband mood everything frels stranger and moodier from the jump. By season three Trek was "domesticated" but in season one it was wilder and willing to be even unsettling. We got a ticking clock situation exacerbated by "pandemic" making the crew emotionally unstable. This allows for the fun moments, like Riley in engineering or Sulu swinging a foil while shirtless but also Spock's breakdown just masterfully done by Nimoy, really shattering Spock to pieces, then Kirk bares his soul and you realize the mixture of arrogance and regrets his life as an officer on the fast track entails. We also get the introduction of the slingshot effect time travel technique. Learning about how this was supposed to be the first part of a two oart story makes me wish they would have been able to pull that off more on the show.
One of my very favorite episodes. I saw this again after my gaydar had been activated and noticed George Takei is enjoying that all just a LITTLE too much. I wonder if… Two years later, yes, he came out. I'll take you home again, Irene… One More Time!! Oh, and they discover time travel, making it a standard Star Trek trope. I keep forgetting this was such an early episode. This way it makes sense for the Next Generation to do the same thing as their second episode. The Original Series was on too late for most of my friends to see it (it was also on an out-of-town station so I couldn't see it anyway), but a lot of them said that their mothers really liked it, especially for Mr. Spock. This is one of the best episodes to show why that was.
I read somewhere that Spock's breakdown was the longest single-shot soliloquy in the series. No slicing or dicing of takes. Just one long scene for Nimoy.
Takei was definitely hot back then, I see why Shatner's ego never let George go shirtless more often. As for the episode: One of the all-timers, definitely in my top 5 TOS episodes, possibly in my top 10 Trek episodes period. It's a shame the TNG episode that shamelessly rips it off doesn't measure up, but TNG S1 had bigger problems than that.
The bottle episodes were always my favorites. Since they didn't have to spend time introducing a bunch of guest stars and a whole alien civilization with all their idiosyncrasies, they could spend more time on the main cast and the drama that drives the plot.
Inspired by your videos, I have begun my own TOS rewatch, and saw this recently. It is, sadly, the beginning of the silliness and incomprehensibilty of Star Trek time travel. This time it's, "So there are 2 Enterprises for 3 days, and if the one that went back contacts the one that hasn't yet, what would happen? No, don't ask, just roll the credits."
Bec ause Shatner said, "God dammit, George isn't the only one who's going to get his shirt off in this episode!" Reminicent of Tim Allen in Galaxy Quest.
I had always thought the title of this episode was rather odd and didn’t make much sense, until I recently heard The Ensign’s Log for that time period and realized that it could be taken literally. :D Also, LOVED your portrayal of one-upmanship in overacting with Leonard Nimoy and then William Shatner.
I don’t hold this episode in quite as high esteem as some others do (I’ve seen some people say it’s comparable to “Amok Time” or “Balance of Terror”), but it’s still a very fun episode that perfectly encapsulates the spirit and fun of Star Trek (musketeer Sulu is the best Sulu!)
I love the shot during the shirtless Sulu with the sword scene when stops and is contemplating his sword and promptly jabs his thumb painfully against the tip of sword; his reaction, startled expression, and just as quickly he’s back to further swashbuckling. I laugh every time I see that scene.
A little context with the space cooties, and the time the episode was made. There was a scare at the time involving different forms of ice, and how they might "infect" regular water. There is a tiny grain of truth to this, in that there are different forms of ice that form in response to different conditions. But of course, the scare took this to extremes, and supposedly these altered forms of ice would "infect" regular water and cause it to freeze at room temperature and end all life on the planet. There was no scientific basis to the scare, but it did result in a 1963 sci-fi novel involving a substance called "ice-nine", and this episode. Today it's just another sci-fi thing, people don't remember that there was once a very real scare involving this concept. You can roughly compare it to the scare that the LHC was going to make black holes and destroy the planet.
@@BlownMacTruck I honestly forgot the name of it, I read it decades ago when I was a kid (and it was old then - both it and TOS are before my time). Anyway...my point wasn't to talk about his novel. My point was to talk about the real life scare that existed at the time about different forms of ice, and how both the novel and this episode were loosely based on it.
This has always been my favorite episode, and probably mostly because of what it doesn't have. No wildly fantastic and implausible plot devices, no alien monsters, and certainly no shape-shifters, and only a bit of time travel near the end, and even then, only a few days backward. BTW the original idea was to combine this with "Tomorrow is yesterday" as a two-parter. That would have made sense, but I'm still glad they didn't. I like slow pacing, and this is a great example. BTW when TNG remade it, I was so skieved that it turned me off that whole series for years. Blehhh.
My favorite TOS episode. Full stop. I was so excited in ‘87 that the Naked Now was an early TNG episode. They stopped the engines! So much drama! Yes sir, Mr. Shives - you picked a winner.
This was one of my favorite episodes. It was a brilliant vehicle to give insight into these (somewhat new) characters early in the series. Plus, it was the first time they ever time traveled and opened up the possibility of intentionally doing it again using the same method in possible later episodes. But they never use this method to time travel again in the series. It was always some other means of traveling through time in other episodes. Some missed opportunities for intentional time traveling stories, I think. One big peeve is that - why didn't Kirk and Spock get the space bug when Spock gave Sulu the neck pinch and Kirk caught him as he was falling?!? Sulu was DRIPPING with sweat! WTF???
I always wondered if the eps where the crew was affected mentally by outside forces (a common trope in scifi even now) was representative of the idea of Space Sickness combined with the concern of biological contamination. The isolation, confined space & pressure astronauts would be under would be pretty intense. There was a real concern that crew members would crack. Same for biological contaminants which could go either way, either from the crew to the environment or from the environment to the crew. Yes it's melodramatic & probably a cost effective way to inject tension into a story but it's still based in real problems for manned space flights.
Admit it! When you think of this episode, the shirtless Sulu pops to mind as the iconic image for this episode, as Kirk buried in tribbles is the iconic image in The Trouble With Tribbles! Thank goodness it was left in!
Okay, I confess….This is one of my favorite episodes. I think that most of my favorite episodes are in the first season, followed by a few in the second season, but the 3rd season, things go downhill. I think the only episode in the third season which has some merit is, “The Tholian Web” if, it was better directed, and the script was tweaked, it could’ve been one of the best….IMHO. ☺️ Nice job Steve, on this retrospective and review!
I really like “The Naked Time" for the character insights. They even reference Sulu's interest in botany, a good follow up to his role in "Where No Man Has Gone Before."
As campy as this episode is, I think it is one of the most important in all of Star Trek. I think it unintentionally proved that Starfleet is a military organization. It shows just how important each of the crew members and their expertise is. How much they really give up a lot to join Starfleet. How much of themselves they must sacrifice. My favorite part is how it is revealed that Spock joined Starfleet to run away. The military is the perfect place for logic. He doesn’t have to suppress his emotions because there is no place for them. Yet now that wall has broken down, and he is facing his fears. My point is that I think this was a fun way to introduce character backstory, because going forward you will always know: Sulu is a swashbuckler, Spock is needy, Kirk is sad, and Uhuru DGAF!
You can see why Synthahol was used on board Starfleet ships instead of real booze, as apparently everyone is a really bad drunk. Going to the Enterprises bar would be a nightmare as everyone would be either going berserk, crying about feelings or getting it on with anyone. Hmm actually this sounds pretty much like any normal night out..
The story goes that they gave George Takei an option between a samurai sword and the foil, and he chose the foil specifically to avoid the stereotype of "Japanese guy with a samurai sword." Plus, he'd already done that on The Twilight Zone.
Apparently that was the original plan, but George Takei talked them into letting him have a fencing foil instead. I think he thought it might have been a bit too cliché for Sulu to be running around with a katana. That being said, everyone soon came to regret giving him any kind of sword at all!🤣
It should be noted that Riley's appearance in Conscience of the King was not originally intended. When the actor got the part for the pick up roll, they realized that he had appeared before, so changed the one-off character's name to match his previous appearance.
I love these hilarious episode summaries that describe the plot accurately but replace things with comedic lines. It reminds me of a recap series I used to watch for a different show (not sci-fi).
In college, I wound up in a half-day workshop with the Martha Graham Dance Ensemble. Shatner's classic convulsive moves make more sense after you learn about one of her core movement/principals of "contract and release." I guess it doesn't change how weird it looks in a sci fi show, but good to know it comes from SOMEWHERE, like actual training.
Dr. Bruce Hyde went on to become a professor of Communications at St. Cloud State University in Minnesota. I really liked him as an instructor - very charismatic and energetic. I was only slightly disappointed that I had classes with 'Dr. Hyde' instead of 'Dr. Jekyll.'
My dad watched Star Trek in syndication in the late 70s/early 80s and usually I just caught the last 15 minutes of most episodes once I got home from school. I mostly remember both my parents LOVED Riley and it's so odd to realize he was only in 2 episodes.
Why both TOS & TNG chose to have their episode where the leads act out of character SO early in their run is beyond me. We don’t know these characters yet. It works in syndication where you’ve seen all the episodes already but how it worked at the time, I don’t know.
The TNG episode is using a leftover script from the Star Trek: Phase Two series they were working on in the 70s that never got off the ground. It would've been a direct sequel to this episode. There are a few episodes in that first season of TNG that use old Phase Two scripts.
TOS didn`t *choose* anything of the kind. TNG came along and COPIED The Naked Time, even down to an almost identical title. And TNG was 22 years after TOS. So not a coincidence like Deep Impact and Armageddon, a deliberate act because they were so bereft of ideas of their own.
I probably saw it in the original run. Being 14 at the time, I would probably have never noticed that as an issue. It would've been a really fine point for me.
I did see this in real time. Even though we didn't know these characters long, we pretty much got the gist. This episode was revelatory though. It revealed the inner psychology of Spock, Sulu, and the others. To see what Spock was constantly dealing with was quite moving and gave him so much more depth. Seeing Sulu as a D'Artagnon figure rather than a stereotypical Japanese warrior was a shot at preconceived notions and just a goddamned hoot.
According to George Takei, they were originally going to make him a samurai for this episode, but he talked them out of it-good thing too, samurai armor definitely involves covering the abs
Not Jeff here. I had a friend from Trek cons that I met periodically through our high school days. We always met by bursting into a rousing rendition of "I'll Take you Home Again Kathleen."
This episode was one of my favorites when I watched the early reruns as a preteen. The story held my attention as a (somewhat) clueless youth. I agree with your review with one exception: Space Cooties. With all the wonderful techno-babble, Steve, you could have called the space cooties, something exotic like Glurb, French Toast, oh!, hey, or even Space Cooties! Had you said space cooties, I might have doubled over laughing.
Applause for this series. I usually love bottle episodes. No flashy settings, no big guest stars, just clever and compelling writing, more often than not.
I've always thought it was too bad that Bruce Hyde's O'Riley never became a regular on the show. HIs two appearances were very memorable, and he had definite chemistry with the rest of the cast.
This episode could have been hot garbage and it would still be totally worth it to see Shatner and shirtless George Takei going to town on the scenery. What an absolute delight ^_^
I was thinking the whole time he was doing this review-realizing it was a 'bottle episode' series-that I hope he does 'Where Silence Has Lease.' I know a lot of people hate that episode, but I really love it. I'm curious to hear Steve's thoughts.
As an 11 year old watching Star Trek episodes weekly as they were released, this episode cracked me up. I think I liked Riley the best when security finally nabs him, and as they grabbed him, he says, "No dance tonight."
I've never seen this episode, so I didn't realize how much TNG's The Naked Now wasn't so much an homage but nearly a beat-for-beat copy of The Naked Time
Naked Time was a good opportunity for the audience to get a view of the main characters of the show. A lot of people also complained about Naked Now from TNG, but I defend it with the same reasoning.
Steve, if I may ask: what is your take on TNG's "The Naked Now"? I'm guessing not too high since it's a first season episode, but a certain scene pretty much created a whole subgenre of Rule 34. That's got to be worth some pages in somebody's book as Riker said in "11001001".
It's not a good episode, but the comic performances by Spiner and Stewart are some of my favorite TNG moments. I do think he might have reviewed Naked Now at some point.
I thought it was disappointing when The Naked Now gave us a needless explanation that the virus generates excess alcohol in the blood, which means all that melodrama comes from the characters being s-faced drunk. For me, the only saving grace is Patrick Stewart's very obvious "I'm really starting to think I made a huge mistake signing that multi-year contract, can my agent get me out of this?" performance.
OMG! How dare you spoil this episode! It's been barely 57 years, 3 months, and 20 days since it aired! How can you expect people to watch TV shows that quickly!
I love bottle episodes - sometimes the restrictions lead to better writing. I think the best bottle episodes were done by British (surreal) sitcom The Goodies. The episodes Eathanasia and The End both have only the characters interacting with each other and both episodes end in them dying (and The End also has a Star Trek reference in the final scene)
Fun fact: the over-acting contest between Shatner and Nimoy was so intense that it actually came to life and had a child. That baby was Nicholas Cage.
I am really glad I wasn't drinking anything when I read this, or I would need a new keyboard.
😂😂😂😂😂😂
If there was ever a defence for Roe Vs Wade…..
I just signed up to explore, Strange New Worlds!!.....said in a Nicholas Cage voice.
It's a shame they didn't give Uhuru more opportunities to wise crack.
I'm pretty sure Nichols ad-libbed that line without anybody's permission.
Even more a shame: You could leave those last three words out and it would ring at least as true.
Uhura is a character not held back by limited writing, but struggling through it.
Quite right.
Fun fact: The restaurant made of ham in the shape of Shatner's head was located in Kirkham Maryland.
“Take D'Artagnan here to Sickbay.”
Best line in the whole episode!
And people say Vulcans don't have a sense of humor. They absolutely do, it's just so dry and snarky most humans rarely even catch on. Spock here is actually laying it on a bit thick by Vulcan standards. 🤨
@@edwardphilibin3151 he’s only half Vulcan.
Sarek would disapprove.
They drop Sulu to the deck after the neck pinch takes him out. 😅
@@jollyjohnthepirate3168
And why doesn’t Spock get space cooties from the neck pinch?
The early episodes establish quite a lot more about Sulu than we usually give them credit for. The first episode to air, "The Man Trap", shows Sulu's passion for botany, particularly for hand-puppet-based flora, which Reilly mentions here and pops up again here and there in later episodes. Mostly, though, we learn that Sulu is something of a serial hobbiest: botany, fencing, firearms, aviation. Basically a proto-Tom Paris minus the story hooks.
Anyhow, I'd like to think that they could/should have just gone with Botany Sulu instead of Fencing Sulu here, with him menacing crew members with a pair of pruning shears in the corridors and threatening Uhuru with a bag of potting soil on the bridge. He can still go shirtless, but a big floppy sun hat would be just as iconic.
Major kudos to Nimoy for completely improvising his breakdown. True talent
Swashbuckling Sulu might be one of the character’s defining moments in all of Trek. Why else would they put that joke in the first Abrams movie?
Abrams took it to samurai, which is an inherent stereotype. I think George might have been confronted with that same stereotype and asked for fencing instead. It seems like it was more forward thinking in TOS. As a Japanese American, he had already been typecast in Midway. I am thinking he was over it.
From what I recall, your "he might have" is pretty close to reality.
That silly unfolding sword sucked so much energy out of the scene. Why does modern (ish, I guess, now) Hollywood do that
I still don't know how they didn't make Kevin Riley a more regular character. Even when he's not zonked out on the space cooties, he's a joy to watch. Love that guy.
Guess they didn't need someone to channel Finnegan.
I agree, Possum Rob!!
The second Riley appearance wasn't even planned. After he was cast for the role in "Conscience of the King," they changed the name of the script's one-shot character to Riley.
No dance tonight 😢
Yeah. I also think SOMETHING could have been made in future episodes of the bond Kirk and he should have as survivors of that failed colony. Is it possible Chekov was already in the works so they didn't need two "young" characters?
Also Possum, good having you back. You single handedly showed me how powerful the word "Goofball" could be. Stay healthy Possum.
Funny how McCoy gives others a hypospray through their uniform sleeve, but for Kirk he rips his sleeve…one of many times Kirk has his uniform ripped, which is hilariously lampshaded in Galaxy Quest
Sulu slicked up with sweat and shirtless and that "sorry, neither" from Uhura... this is my favorite TOS episode by far. And then Kirk stupidly thinking that any fight with Spock could ever go his way, even before the cooties take effect? And I can only imagine the set dressers trying to clean up all the tooth marks left after Schattner and Nimoy retired breathlessly to their trailers. *chef's kiss*
Steve's seriously hitting his stride. I feel like this channel is entering a golden age.
Sulu is, by far, my favorite character from TOS. I got to meet him at a convention in 1986. I was wearing a "Don't call me tiny" button and was treated to his amazing laugh when he noticed it. Everything about George Takei is a joy.
I associate that with The Expanse and a character that… well, the actor did a good job because I was glad for what happened at the end for him.
James Doohan has been fighting against that unrealistic standard of male beauty on screen for at least 20 years, bless him.
If they did it today, they probably would have given him enough CGI fx to make him look like a hunk. A hunk of something, not sure what.
@@ronaldgarrison8478 A hunka hunka haggis?
@@Corbomite_Meatballs😂😅
When will I learn not to watch these videos during dinner? "No being extra-Irish on the bridge!" nearly made fruit cocktail shoot out my nose.
I always found it fascinating that the very first thing they did with TNG (after the establishing intro episodes) was to copy this episode with extra horny.
Fascinating? The first season of TNG was awful, with the only halfway decent episodes being either direct rip-offs of TOS (The Naked *Now*? ffs!) or vaguly disguised rip-offs of TOS. Out of the whole seven seasons there were a score - maybe - of decent episodes. IMO of course...
They knew their fanbase.
Plus a callback later in Skin of Evil
I love that line of Kirk’s “Love! You’re better off without it and I’m better off with a mind” Classic Shatner.👍🏽😊
I was 5 or 6 when this episode aired, and I instantly fell in love with the shirtless and oiled-up Sulu. LOL
Best description ever of what happens when Shatner was let off the the leash. All the ham. And yeah; Nichelle Nichols apparently improvised that line (citation needed but i think i heard her say it), and was a bit worried it wouldnt get past the censors... but it sure did, and world is better for it
Such power in that line though. She said that she was not some man's prize and oh, she's Black.
@@toddramsey3799
I'm happy the suits appreciated what they had there.
♫♪...The helmsmen here in Starfleet bring lethal things aboard.
You give a simple order, they stab you with a sword
Oh, I don't want no more of Starfleet life...♪♫
Gee ma, I want to go. Hey ma I gotta go. Gee ma, I want to go home!
5:22 I don't see how Kirk and Spock AREN'T infected after grappling with Sulu. If one touch is all it takes struggling with a half naked man should be more than enough for you to get the infection.
And so when Spock goes to see nurse Chapel he's already starting to show the signs of the infection.
This to me makes more sense than him becoming infected by Chapel and immediately start showing signs of it. Later when Kirk visits Spock He's been infected by again grappling with Sulu and now starts to show the effects. This makes more sense than both characters becoming instantly affected when everyone else took time to show symptoms.
But hey what do I know I've only seen this about a dozen times since it first aired.
I personally think "No dance tonight" is right up there with "Shaka, when the walls fell."
Sokath, his eyes uncovered.
🤙
I remember reading in one of Nimoy's books, that since he was kind of a method actor, that scene was very cathartic for him. Since he would stay bottled up all day on set, and often still when he got home, getting to let his emotions out was a great release.
Respectfully dissenting with you on Sulu with a foil, Steve. We needed it, Steve. We NEEDED it.
Agreed. Gratitude & respect for Uncle George 🥰
And when people ask George what he looked like in his 20s, he can just point them at this episode.
If I recall, George Takei suggested adding that extra line from Spock to clarify that Sulu's swordsmanship isn't in reference to samurais etc, but more specific to Errol Flynn's Robin Hood-type action, of which George Takei was a big fan as a kid.
I have read that it was a deliberate effort to go against the “inscrutable Asian” stereotype that was common at the time.
Since George Takei was 5 when his family was forced into an internment camp, I'm thinking he saw those movies when they got out. Kind of weird to think that at the same time James Doohan was serving in the army.
it indeed is one of the best TOS episodes, and George Takei still does not get enough credit. I remember watching this in a re-run in the mid-90s. It was this episode when I noticed, Star Trek has this kind of silliness or pulp which can work out. And, George Takei seemingly had the time of his life.
Let me just say that I watched "Classic" Star Trek when there wasn't any other Star Trek. I thought this was one of the best episodes I had seen so far, and I'm sure you would have agree with my 12 year old self. I had already fallen hard for Spock, he was up there with Illya Kuryakin in my heart. But this story really allowed us to see how a good story didn't need expansive sets.
I was right there with you on Star Trek. I know I watched Man From UNCLE, but that is kind of a distant memory.
In "To the Stars" Takei discusses the process of his "swashbuckler" time; including (if memory serves) learning to fake it with a foil practically overnight - after having assured the production team: "Of COURSE I can fence, no problem!"
BTW: In discussing how "slow" the pacing of TOS episodes might be, methinks we should remember that this pacing was pretty standard at the time for ALL shows. Even the earliest Bond movies with Sean Connery, from the same 1960s era, are much slower-paced than more recent films.
If memory serves, there was a sea-change in general video pacing when "Laugh-In" came along; the first special before it became a series was so fast-paced for the time that some viewers claimed to be motion-sick. After a while, everyone else started to catch up.
An earlier draft of the script was apparently intended to have them time travel back three hundred years in order to lead into the episode "Tomorrow is Yesterday".
Man, a time when Sulu was a character so new and lightly defined we only knew he flew the ship? Good thing they never did that again.
Still season one and boy howdy is this a DEFINING episode on multiple levels, for the characters and the TOS era of the franchise as a whole. And since it's season one, from sets, lightingband mood everything frels stranger and moodier from the jump. By season three Trek was "domesticated" but in season one it was wilder and willing to be even unsettling.
We got a ticking clock situation exacerbated by "pandemic" making the crew emotionally unstable. This allows for the fun moments, like Riley in engineering or Sulu swinging a foil while shirtless but also Spock's breakdown just masterfully done by Nimoy, really shattering Spock to pieces, then Kirk bares his soul and you realize the mixture of arrogance and regrets his life as an officer on the fast track entails. We also get the introduction of the slingshot effect time travel technique. Learning about how this was supposed to be the first part of a two oart story makes me wish they would have been able to pull that off more on the show.
I had assumed the comment of 'Sulu being a swashbuckler at heart' was a setup so that his wacky dialogue makes sense... "Richelieu! " etal.
One of my very favorite episodes.
I saw this again after my gaydar had been activated and noticed George Takei is enjoying that all just a LITTLE too much. I wonder if… Two years later, yes, he came out.
I'll take you home again, Irene… One More Time!!
Oh, and they discover time travel, making it a standard Star Trek trope.
I keep forgetting this was such an early episode. This way it makes sense for the Next Generation to do the same thing as their second episode.
The Original Series was on too late for most of my friends to see it (it was also on an out-of-town station so I couldn't see it anyway), but a lot of them said that their mothers really liked it, especially for Mr. Spock.
This is one of the best episodes to show why that was.
I loved this episode when I was a kid. Some episodes seemed to be rerun more than others, and this one was one I was glad they had on rapid rotation.
This is one of my absolute favorite TOS episodes. I wish Reilly had been in more episodes. He was a great character.
My response to this, especially with the phallic symbol in hand and the no clothes visible is “oh my.”
That is all.
I read somewhere that Spock's breakdown was the longest single-shot soliloquy in the series. No slicing or dicing of takes. Just one long scene for Nimoy.
Good to know.
Takei was definitely hot back then, I see why Shatner's ego never let George go shirtless more often.
As for the episode: One of the all-timers, definitely in my top 5 TOS episodes, possibly in my top 10 Trek episodes period. It's a shame the TNG episode that shamelessly rips it off doesn't measure up, but TNG S1 had bigger problems than that.
This episode makes me wish Riley had more appearances. He was used 2 or 3 times in the first season, iirc, but then nothing.
Twice, this and Conscience of a King, as far as I know.
The bottle episodes were always my favorites. Since they didn't have to spend time introducing a bunch of guest stars and a whole alien civilization with all their idiosyncrasies, they could spend more time on the main cast and the drama that drives the plot.
I see Steve used the original effects for that chronometer shot. I like to imagine the decision took a nanosecond.
Inspired by your videos, I have begun my own TOS rewatch, and saw this recently. It is, sadly, the beginning of the silliness and incomprehensibilty of Star Trek time travel. This time it's, "So there are 2 Enterprises for 3 days, and if the one that went back contacts the one that hasn't yet, what would happen? No, don't ask, just roll the credits."
I love these classic episode reviews so much. The nerd-based comedic timing is fantastic
I wondered about this episode for years: why did McCoy feel the need to rip off Kirk's sleeve to apply the antidote, and nobody else's?
Bec ause Shatner said, "God dammit, George isn't the only one who's going to get his shirt off in this episode!" Reminicent of Tim Allen in Galaxy Quest.
I had always thought the title of this episode was rather odd and didn’t make much sense, until I recently heard The Ensign’s Log for that time period and realized that it could be taken literally. :D
Also, LOVED your portrayal of one-upmanship in overacting with Leonard Nimoy and then William Shatner.
I don't think it was that.
Nimoy must have realised he'd never win.
Rather I think he was setting up a bar for Shatner to leap over.
Bottle episodes, eh? Fingers crossed forDS9 Duet. Although there are several categories that one could fit in.
I don’t hold this episode in quite as high esteem as some others do (I’ve seen some people say it’s comparable to “Amok Time” or “Balance of Terror”), but it’s still a very fun episode that perfectly encapsulates the spirit and fun of Star Trek (musketeer Sulu is the best Sulu!)
This got me thinking of all the Bottle episodes of Stargate SG1, or as I like to call them, the shit we blew the fx budget again episodes.
I love the shot during the shirtless Sulu with the sword scene when stops and is contemplating his sword and promptly jabs his thumb painfully against the tip of sword; his reaction, startled expression, and just as quickly he’s back to further swashbuckling. I laugh every time I see that scene.
A little context with the space cooties, and the time the episode was made. There was a scare at the time involving different forms of ice, and how they might "infect" regular water. There is a tiny grain of truth to this, in that there are different forms of ice that form in response to different conditions. But of course, the scare took this to extremes, and supposedly these altered forms of ice would "infect" regular water and cause it to freeze at room temperature and end all life on the planet. There was no scientific basis to the scare, but it did result in a 1963 sci-fi novel involving a substance called "ice-nine", and this episode.
Today it's just another sci-fi thing, people don't remember that there was once a very real scare involving this concept. You can roughly compare it to the scare that the LHC was going to make black holes and destroy the planet.
Ice-9 is from Kurt Vonnegut's "Cat's Cradle"
@@steveng.clinard1766 Right...that's the one I'm thinking of. He wrote it in reponse to concept the scare was based on, just like Star Trek did.
LOL you low key’d one of Kurt Vonnegut’s most well known novels. Jeeze.
@@BlownMacTruck I honestly forgot the name of it, I read it decades ago when I was a kid (and it was old then - both it and TOS are before my time). Anyway...my point wasn't to talk about his novel. My point was to talk about the real life scare that existed at the time about different forms of ice, and how both the novel and this episode were loosely based on it.
5:49 I have always wondered why the shape Scotty chose to cut out wasn't a rectangle or square but something that looks like a cubist's map of Texas.
This has always been my favorite episode, and probably mostly because of what it doesn't have. No wildly fantastic and implausible plot devices, no alien monsters, and certainly no shape-shifters, and only a bit of time travel near the end, and even then, only a few days backward.
BTW the original idea was to combine this with "Tomorrow is yesterday" as a two-parter. That would have made sense, but I'm still glad they didn't.
I like slow pacing, and this is a great example.
BTW when TNG remade it, I was so skieved that it turned me off that whole series for years. Blehhh.
My favorite TOS episode. Full stop.
I was so excited in ‘87 that the Naked Now was an early TNG episode. They stopped the engines! So much drama! Yes sir, Mr. Shives - you picked a winner.
I would have thought the next video was going to be the TNG cover version of this episode, "The Naked Now".
Cheers for Spock's autistic soft meltdown, all my autistic homies love Spock's autistic soft meltdown
This was one of my favorite episodes. It was a brilliant vehicle to give insight into these (somewhat new) characters early in the series. Plus, it was the first time they ever time traveled and opened up the possibility of intentionally doing it again using the same method in possible later episodes. But they never use this method to time travel again in the series. It was always some other means of traveling through time in other episodes. Some missed opportunities for intentional time traveling stories, I think.
One big peeve is that - why didn't Kirk and Spock get the space bug when Spock gave Sulu the neck pinch and Kirk caught him as he was falling?!? Sulu was DRIPPING with sweat! WTF???
I always wondered if the eps where the crew was affected mentally by outside forces (a common trope in scifi even now) was representative of the idea of Space Sickness combined with the concern of biological contamination. The isolation, confined space & pressure astronauts would be under would be pretty intense. There was a real concern that crew members would crack. Same for biological contaminants which could go either way, either from the crew to the environment or from the environment to the crew. Yes it's melodramatic & probably a cost effective way to inject tension into a story but it's still based in real problems for manned space flights.
Admit it! When you think of this episode, the shirtless Sulu pops to mind as the iconic image for this episode, as Kirk buried in tribbles is the iconic image in The Trouble With Tribbles! Thank goodness it was left in!
Sadly they made him put his shirt back on. Dude I’m rolling 😅
Okay, I confess….This is one of my favorite episodes. I think that most of my favorite episodes are in the first season, followed by a few in the second season, but the 3rd season, things go downhill. I think the only episode in the third season which has some merit is, “The Tholian Web” if, it was better directed, and the script was tweaked, it could’ve been one of the best….IMHO. ☺️
Nice job Steve, on this retrospective and review!
I really like “The Naked Time" for the character insights. They even reference Sulu's interest in botany, a good follow up to his role in "Where No Man Has Gone Before."
I like they compared Sulu to D'Artagnan and not a samurai or Ninja.
As campy as this episode is, I think it is one of the most important in all of Star Trek. I think it unintentionally proved that Starfleet is a military organization. It shows just how important each of the crew members and their expertise is. How much they really give up a lot to join Starfleet. How much of themselves they must sacrifice. My favorite part is how it is revealed that Spock joined Starfleet to run away. The military is the perfect place for logic. He doesn’t have to suppress his emotions because there is no place for them. Yet now that wall has broken down, and he is facing his fears.
My point is that I think this was a fun way to introduce character backstory, because going forward you will always know: Sulu is a swashbuckler, Spock is needy, Kirk is sad, and Uhuru DGAF!
You can see why Synthahol was used on board Starfleet ships instead of real booze, as apparently everyone is a really bad drunk. Going to the Enterprises bar would be a nightmare as everyone would be either going berserk, crying about feelings or getting it on with anyone.
Hmm actually this sounds pretty much like any normal night out..
Riley's desire for ice cream with every meal is echoed by Crusher in TNG.
You're doing bottle episodes!!!
Does this mean that we'll finally get to see your thoughts on Duet!?
Dude, are you talking about Duet the Fox series with Mary Paige Keller? Bring it on!
Still amazing that they didn't have Sulu use a samurai sword.
The story goes that they gave George Takei an option between a samurai sword and the foil, and he chose the foil specifically to avoid the stereotype of "Japanese guy with a samurai sword." Plus, he'd already done that on The Twilight Zone.
I don't think the character was Japanese yet; he was The Asian Guy.
Apparently that was the original plan, but George Takei talked them into letting him have a fencing foil instead. I think he thought it might have been a bit too cliché for Sulu to be running around with a katana. That being said, everyone soon came to regret giving him any kind of sword at all!🤣
@@SteveShivesAlso they had asked him if he could fence, and he told them absofuckinglutely, then had to go out and learn in record time. 😀
Also, I really love "Space Coodies".
It should be noted that Riley's appearance in Conscience of the King was not originally intended. When the actor got the part for the pick up roll, they realized that he had appeared before, so changed the one-off character's name to match his previous appearance.
I love these hilarious episode summaries that describe the plot accurately but replace things with comedic lines. It reminds me of a recap series I used to watch for a different show (not sci-fi).
Favorite episode review to date. Hilarious.
In college, I wound up in a half-day workshop with the Martha Graham Dance Ensemble. Shatner's classic convulsive moves make more sense after you learn about one of her core movement/principals of "contract and release." I guess it doesn't change how weird it looks in a sci fi show, but good to know it comes from SOMEWHERE, like actual training.
Dr. Bruce Hyde went on to become a professor of Communications at St. Cloud State University in Minnesota. I really liked him as an instructor - very charismatic and energetic. I was only slightly disappointed that I had classes with 'Dr. Hyde' instead of 'Dr. Jekyll.'
My dad watched Star Trek in syndication in the late 70s/early 80s and usually I just caught the last 15 minutes of most episodes once I got home from school. I mostly remember both my parents LOVED Riley and it's so odd to realize he was only in 2 episodes.
Why both TOS & TNG chose to have their episode where the leads act out of character SO early in their run is beyond me. We don’t know these characters yet. It works in syndication where you’ve seen all the episodes already but how it worked at the time, I don’t know.
The TNG episode is using a leftover script from the Star Trek: Phase Two series they were working on in the 70s that never got off the ground. It would've been a direct sequel to this episode.
There are a few episodes in that first season of TNG that use old Phase Two scripts.
TOS didn`t *choose* anything of the kind. TNG came along and COPIED The Naked Time, even down to an almost identical title. And TNG was 22 years after TOS. So not a coincidence like Deep Impact and Armageddon, a deliberate act because they were so bereft of ideas of their own.
I probably saw it in the original run. Being 14 at the time, I would probably have never noticed that as an issue. It would've been a really fine point for me.
I guess knowing what they wouldn’t normally do in their right mind can be a way of learning what they would.
I did see this in real time. Even though we didn't know these characters long, we pretty much got the gist. This episode was revelatory though. It revealed the inner psychology of Spock, Sulu, and the others. To see what Spock was constantly dealing with was quite moving and gave him so much more depth. Seeing Sulu as a D'Artagnon figure rather than a stereotypical Japanese warrior was a shot at preconceived notions and just a goddamned hoot.
According to George Takei, they were originally going to make him a samurai for this episode, but he talked them out of it-good thing too, samurai armor definitely involves covering the abs
Too bad they didn't have Trip Tucker. He would have them engines restarted
Joe is clearly on the fence about a potential new hobby
It's a shame Chekov wasn't in the show yet. I would have loved to see Walter Koenig in the overacting competition.
Cranking the bemused up to 11 would have been interesting.
I never got how it was chapel who gave Spock cooties; shouldn’t it have been the skin to skin contact with sulu? Kirk should have gotten it as well…
Not Jeff here. I had a friend from Trek cons that I met periodically through our high school days. We always met by bursting into a rousing rendition of "I'll Take you Home Again Kathleen."
A bottle episode in that they not only emptied the bottle but crawled into it (that is went on a truly epic bender and had a black out).
IIRC they originally wanted Sulu to have a katana and Takei moved them to the fencing idea, which was a great call.
"Tell your disappointment to suck it! I'm doing a bottle episode!" --Jeff Winger
This episode was one of my favorites when I watched the early reruns as a preteen. The story held my attention as a (somewhat) clueless youth. I agree with your review with one exception: Space Cooties. With all the wonderful techno-babble, Steve, you could have called the space cooties, something exotic like Glurb, French Toast, oh!, hey, or even Space Cooties! Had you said space cooties, I might have doubled over laughing.
Hey I've just recently discovered your channel but I am loving these videos! Keep up the great work
Applause for this series. I usually love bottle episodes. No flashy settings, no big guest stars, just clever and compelling writing, more often than not.
An episode so nice, they had to make it twice!
Go to the store, buy some more, 99 bottles of Trek on the wall!
I've always thought it was too bad that Bruce Hyde's O'Riley never became a regular on the show. HIs two appearances were very memorable, and he had definite chemistry with the rest of the cast.
I'm definitely stealing "Sorry, neither" lol
This episode could have been hot garbage and it would still be totally worth it to see Shatner and shirtless George Takei going to town on the scenery. What an absolute delight ^_^
I was thinking the whole time he was doing this review-realizing it was a 'bottle episode' series-that I hope he does 'Where Silence Has Lease.' I know a lot of people hate that episode, but I really love it. I'm curious to hear Steve's thoughts.
As an 11 year old watching Star Trek episodes weekly as they were released, this episode cracked me up. I think I liked Riley the best when security finally nabs him, and as they grabbed him, he says, "No dance tonight."
I've never seen this episode, so I didn't realize how much TNG's The Naked Now wasn't so much an homage but nearly a beat-for-beat copy of The Naked Time
Naked Time was a good opportunity for the audience to get a view of the main characters of the show. A lot of people also complained about Naked Now from TNG, but I defend it with the same reasoning.
Naked Time/Naked Now is my favorite TOS/TNG double feature.
Did they only refer to it as polywater intoxication on TNG?
Steve, if I may ask: what is your take on TNG's "The Naked Now"? I'm guessing not too high since it's a first season episode, but a certain scene pretty much created a whole subgenre of Rule 34. That's got to be worth some pages in somebody's book as Riker said in "11001001".
It's not a good episode, but the comic performances by Spiner and Stewart are some of my favorite TNG moments. I do think he might have reviewed Naked Now at some point.
I thought it was disappointing when The Naked Now gave us a needless explanation that the virus generates excess alcohol in the blood, which means all that melodrama comes from the characters being s-faced drunk. For me, the only saving grace is Patrick Stewart's very obvious "I'm really starting to think I made a huge mistake signing that multi-year contract, can my agent get me out of this?" performance.
OMG! How dare you spoil this episode! It's been barely 57 years, 3 months, and 20 days since it aired! How can you expect people to watch TV shows that quickly!
Great narrative. And , yeah , even as a kid I thought Sulu was ripped.
I love bottle episodes - sometimes the restrictions lead to better writing. I think the best bottle episodes were done by British (surreal) sitcom The Goodies. The episodes Eathanasia and The End both have only the characters interacting with each other and both episodes end in them dying (and The End also has a Star Trek reference in the final scene)
🎶 Goodie goodie yum yum 🎶