POKER IS A BETTER GAME THAN CHESS (and it’s more fun too!)

Episode Title:  The Corbomite Maneuver

Air Date: 11/10/1966

Written by Jerry Sohl

Directed by Joseph Sargent

Cast: William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk    Leonard Nimoy as Lieutenant Commander Spock             DeForest Kelley as Dr. Leonard H. McCoy  AKA "Bones"            James Doohan  as Lieutenant Commander Montgomery Scott AKA “Scotty”   George Takei  as Lieutenant  Hikaru Sulu    Nichelle Nichols as Lieutenant Nyota Uhura     Anthony Call as Lieutenant Bailey       Grace Lee Whitney as Yeoman First Class Janice Rand       Bill Blackburn  as Lieutenant Hadley     Eddie Paskey as Lieutenant Leslie            Frank da Vinci as  Crewman          Ron Veto as Crewman           Sean Morgan as Crewman    Mittie Lawrence as Crew Woman        Ena Hartman as Crew Woman No. 2          Gloria Calomee as Crew Woman          Bruce Mars as Crewman No. 1     John Gabriel as Crewman             Clint Howard as Balok           Walker Edmiston as Voice of Balok      Ted Cassidy as Voice of Balok Puppet

Ships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, Fesarius of the First Federation

Planets:  None

My Spoiler filled summary and review:  The episode begins on the bridge of the Enterprise, where Mr. Spock is leading the bridge crew in the picture taking of stars for the creation of star charts.  Lt. Bailey is bored out of his mind and lets the whole bridge know how useless he finds star chart making.  I have to admit there is part of me that agrees with him.  When your ship can move faster than light what is the point of stopping in a random place and take pictures?  I am sure it serves some purpose but I just can’t figure it out.

Ah...what can that hurt? It's just a cube!

                While the chart making is going on a mysterious cube appears in space and positions itself in front of the Enterprise.  When the Enterprise tries to move the cube blocks the ship in whatever direction it tries to leave.  If I want to put a cheap dad joke in here, I would say that the block keeps blocking their way.  Mr. Spock puts the ship on red alert.

                At the time all this is going on Captain Kirk is in sick bay getting his physical from Dr. McCoy.  Dr. McCoy sees the red alert but concludes the physical of his Captain is far more important to complete than for the Captain of the ship to be informed of the ship’s emergency.   This tells us two possible things either Dr. McCoy has a messed up set of priorities or the crew of the Enterprise pulls the red alert switch a little too often unnecessarily.  Captain Kirk checked the bridge when he sees the red alert is on and determines the threat is not that important so he will be able to stop by his quarters to change his clothes.

Besides firing phasers does anyone have any other ideas?

                Later in the conference room the bridge crew and senior staff are trying to figure out the best way to deal with this growing problem of being trapped by a shiny cube.  Mr. Spock makes a suggestion that what the cube could be is a type of flypaper and the ship might be in danger.  Lt. Bailey, who earlier tried to suggest the Captain to destroy the cube with phasers by telling him that’s how he would vote, starts readying the phaser crew without receiving the actual order to do so from the Captain.  Kirk, who earlier had to remind Bailey that the ship wasn’t a democracy, now has to chastise him for acting before he gave an order.

                Captain Kirk decides to try another escape but this time the cube comes closer and starts to emit a deadly radiation.  Spock informs the Captain that the radiation is about to become terminal to them in a few more seconds.  Kirk orders Bailey to fire the phasers and Bailey nearly freezes and has to be told by Kirk twice. This of course makes Bailey look bad however is not very helpful for Mr. Spock either was clearly wrong about the “we’ll be dead in a matter of seconds” statement he made because with Bailey’s hesitation destroying the cube clearly took more than a few seconds.  After the danger has passed Kirk chastises Bailey for his sluggish response.  This captures the attention of Dr. McCoy.

                Dr. McCoy believes that Kirk is putting too much pressure on Lt. Bailey and that he promoted him to the position of Chief Navigator too soon.  Dr. McCoy also thinks that Kirk sees little bit of himself in Lt. Bailey.  I think that Captain Kirk just misses Gary Mitchell and holds his present navigator to the same standards as the old one.  Which probably what McCoy feels is so unfair.  Later in Kirk’s quarters the two men continue talking about this over a couple of drinks.   Now I don’t really think is a responsible thing for the two of them to be drinking during a period of time when the ship could still potentially be in serious danger, but I suppose the two of them have been at it long enough that they understand with their own limits are. 

While continuing their conversation about Lt. Bailey, Yeoman Rand shows up to try to fix the Captain up with a bit of dinner.   Kirk is curious to why Starfleet keeps assigning him female yeomen, McCoy suggests that perhaps he and Yeoman Rand would make a good couple, which Kirk deflects by saying he already has one lady and her name is Enterprise.  It appears in the 23^rd century of Star Trek that dating one’s subordinates is considered okay.  Maybe there is some logical sense in that in the world of Star Trek the idea of using one’s powers a superior to harm or coerce someone you have romantic feelings for is considered so inconceivable that regulations against it have completely lapsed. 

The danger has not yet passed it is in fact just beginning.  For an extremely large ship arrives before the Enterprise.  The ship is a giant sphere that is so large it fills the entire viewscreen. An image so terrifying it causes Lt. Bailey to figuratively crap himself so bad that he needs Lt. Sulu to do some of his job for him such as adjust the viewscreen.  Kirk tries to communicate to the alien ship and extend greetings however his offers are rebuffed by a Cmdr. Balok who is the captain of this giant vessel that he calls the Fesarius. Balok tells the crew the Enterprise that they are trespassers and as such they will be destroyed.  He points to the destruction of the cube as evidence of their harmful intentions.  They are given ten minutes to make any religious preparations they make for death.  Kirk tries to plead with Balok but to no avail.  They try to escape but they are prevented.  Spock is able to download an image of their opponent through their communication system.  Bailey has had it, with death’s door close at hand he is the only Starfleet officer who fails to keep his cool.  He goes on a rather entertaining rant  in which he yells at his fellow crew members and Kirk has to dismiss him from bridge.

Wow! That is kind of big!

Big?  Yeah we didn't know the half of it!

Kirk, becoming desperate, turns to Spock and asks if he thought there’s anything he’s overlooked but Spock simply responds that sometimes in chess you find yourself in checkmate in the game is over.  At this point Dr. McCoy decides it is good time to tell the Captain that he seemed to be a creep with Bailey, and he should be concerned because he’s going to put that in his report. This seems utterly hilarious and it really tells you something about Dr. McCoy.  He is either so dense and so self-absorbed by his own concerns that the entire world disappears around him and he is completely oblivious to the dangers and to the fact he’s probably going to be dead in four minutes; or he is so confident in Captain Kirk’s abilities to save them from this horrible situation that not only does he believe that he will survive he also is of the belief that it is no problem for him to try to save time and distract Kirk with this argument about Bailey while the Captain is directly facing the threat!  I like to think it’s the latter option.

McCoy does one good thing and that is he plants an idea in Kirk’s head when he tells him he’s not bluffing.   It makes Kirk think of the game poker and how it is very different from Mr. Spock's favorite game of chess.  He orders Uhura to open communication with Balok and says that regulations require that he inform Balok that one of Starfleet’s great secrets that they keep out of their database is their weapon they call Corbomite.  A weapon that is so powerful that any enemy who destroys one of their vessels gets in turn blasted with this energy that destroys the attackers' vessel.  Kirk mentions that death has very little meaning for them and he would rather Balok attack them now because he is growing bored. 

Balok doesn’t respond and as the minutes tick away Bailey returns to duty and Mr. Spock reminisces that he regrets not getting to meet Balok for he reminded him of his own father.  Scotty says that it makes him feel sorry for his mother and Spock responds by saying his mother considered herself to be a fortunate Earth woman.  In the face of death Mr. Spock and finally admitted he was half human and not just a Vulcan with a distant human ancestor as he said in the previous episode.

Time lapses and nothing happens.  Balok then asked to see proof the Corobomite device to which Kirk tells him to go pound sand.   The Fesarius retreats but a smaller scout vessel detaches and Balok tells the crew of the Enterprise that the smaller vessel is still capable destroying them and it will tow the Enterprise to a planet where the crew will be imprisoned and their ship will be destroyed.  But the little vessel lacking the power that its two predecessors had is unable to hold the Enterprise.  The strain on trying to hold on one of Starfleet's finest vessels causes the little ship to be drained of all its power allowing the Enterprise to break free and condemns itself to spiral out of control to its doom.  Despite everything that Balok had done to them Kirk decides that a great first impression would be for them to rescue their former opponent. 

Bend down so we don't beam your head into a cement block or something worse!

Kirk, McCoy, and Bailey form rescue party and board the enemy ship by way of their ship’s transporter.  They hunch down because Scotty told them that the other ship was cramped and he didn’t want to beam their heads into a wall, he didn't actually say that last part but that’s really what he meant.  When the trio arrived they find what they thought was Balok was indeed a dummy.  They find a small alien that almost resembles a human child who introduces himself as the real Balok the commander and in fact only crew of the Fesarius.  Balok goes on to explain that he was merely testing the crew of the Enterprise to see what type of people they were.  The scary looking dummy is something Balok uses in order to intimidate people because he doesn’t imagine that anyone would be intimidated with the sight of himself.  He goes on to call the dummy’s old version of a “Mr. Hyde.”

Will the real Balok please stand up?

We learn a lot about Balok in this exchange.  The first thing we learn is that he has no idea what the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde story is all about.  Mr. Hyde was not in a dummy but rather a dangerous alternative personality, induced by a formula, who does evil things against the main personality's wishes and is whose goal is to usurp the main personality.  The second thing we learn is Balok is so insecure about his physical appearance that he employs a dummy to intimidate people because apparently his gigantic plant size starship that can most likely destroy any other starship it encounters isn’t enough to intimidate people.

Balok is lonely in his automated starship and he asked for some companionship.  He wants one of the crew of the Enterprise to stay with him to keep him company and participate in cultural exchange.  Lt. Bailey volunteers and Captain Kirk agrees to let him as he thinks it is a wonderful idea.  

First contact Captain Kirk and Commander Balok

Additional thoughts:  With the pilots over the first season has truly begun.  We see that the Enterprise has had a small refit and you can see the change on the bridge as the small mini scanners that used to stick out all the time are gone replaced with ones that stay tucked away until their needed and pulled up.  The uniforms are also now up to par, although Lt. Uhura is sporting command gold, everyone else is wearing the uniform that they will wear primarily throughout the season.  We also see the arrival of the classic Star Trek miniskirt that was apparently the brainchild of Grace Lee Whitney, who thought that the women would still be allowed to look like women.  I don’t know that story’s true it is a rumor I’ve heard on the Internet.

                With the exception of Pavel Chekov and Christine Chapel who will show up later in the series, the classical crew has been almost completely assembled.  Dr. McCoy the third and permanent doctor has his first appearance set to become one of the big three of the series.  Granted his actions in this episode made me question his sanity.  We see that Lt. Sulu has moved over to the helm replacing the poor strangled Lt. Kelso.   I think that was a great career move for him and right away we see how good he is because not only does he do his job sometimes he also has to do Bailey’s.

                Speaking of Bailey, I know this episode was supposed to end on a feel-good note but am I the only one who thinks Bailey might be some sort of pedophile?  He was real eager to join the ship with the childlike Balok as his only companion.  And all this time since we’ve never heard from Balok’s First Federation.   They were so powerful that you thought our Federation would try to make them allies.  I wonder why we never heard from them again?   I think Mr. Bailey, who is no relation to George, may not be the good old American kid that we all thought he was.  So much for first contact, we could have used the First Federation against the Dominion or the Borg. 

FINAL GRADE 3 of 5