SOME GROW OLD AND A COMMODORE GROWS DUMB!

Episode Title:  The Deadly Years

Air Date: 9/22/1967

Written by David P. Harmon

Directed by Joseph Pevney

Cast: William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk    Leonard Nimoy as 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          Eddie Paskey as Lieutenant Leslie                 Bill Blackburn as Lieutenant Hadley     Beverly Washburn  as Lieutenant Arlene Galway        Roger Holloway as Lieutenant Lemli                        Majel Barrett as Nurse Christine Chapel          Frank Da Vinci as Lieutenant Brent       Walter Koenig as Ensign Pavel Chekov                 Carolyn Nelson as Yeoman Second Class Atkins                       Sarah Marshall as Dr. Janet Wallace               Charles Drake as Commodore Stocker                    Felix Locher as               Robert Johnson           Laura Wood as Elaine Johnson

Ships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, three unnamed Romulan Birds of Prey

Planets:  Gamma Hydra IV

My Spoiler filled summary and review: This episode begins, as so many do, with the Enterprise beaming down a landing party to an alien world.  They are not however “boldly going where no man has gone before” instead they are just checking up on a scientific team already exploring the place.  There doesn’t seem to be anyone around.  Kirk noted that Professor Johnson seemed distracted when he spoke to him over the subspace channels.   Kirk orders the landing party, consisting of Spock, McCoy, Scotty, Chekov, and a lieutenant named Galway, to search the area and try to find the scientists.

And old man's dead body scared Chekov silly

                Chekov has the most luck.  He finds a dead body and it causes him to scream in terror.  He runs outside to tell the others about the dead body.   The rest of the party goes into the building examine the body, and McCoy determines that the man died due to the natural causes of old age.  Spock protests that it would be impossible as there was no one on the scientific expedition over 30.  Just then an elderly couple walks in.  The two people are not only physically frail but they are hard of hearing and their mental capacity seems to be limited.  The man identifies himself as Robert Johnson and his wife Elaine.  When asks for their ages the both identify in their late 20s. 

A young couple

Back up on the Enterprise McCoy’s tests can’t explain what is causing the Johnsons and their team to age so rapidly.  In the senior officers meeting Kirk invited two individuals who they are performing taxi service to Starbase 10.  One is the new Starbase commander, Commodore Stocker, a career bureaucrat who managed to get up the ranks to achieve a starbase command.   The Commodore has an interest in getting to his post as soon as possible.  He often passive aggressively suggests going to Starbase 10 saying things like “the scientific labs on a Starbase are so much larger and nicer.  Maybe we should go there.”The second person is a medical researcher who happens to be an old romantic acquaintance of Captain Kirk, Dr. Janet Wallace.  Dr. Wallace we learn is also recently widowed. 

She is Kirk's ex-girlfriend. What a surprise!

    McCoy is unable to save the Johnsons.  As he dies Robert Johnson mutters how beautiful his wife was.   That might have been the end of it but it wasn’t for every member of the landing party, with exception to Mr. Chekov, started to come down with problems.  Lt. Galway starts to lose her hearing, McCoy starts to get grey hair, Kirk develops advanced arthritis, Scotty wrinkles like a prone, and even Mr. Spock is affected but as Vulcans age more slowly his deterioration is not as rapid. 

problems arise

  The aging also does not occur at the same rates.  Lt. Galway ages the fastest and ultimately dies.  McCoy and Scotty prune up real fast but for the most part remain mentally sharp.   Mr. Spock benefits from the fact Vulcans naturally aging slower, so even though he has shot up to over 100 physically he is the healthiest of the away team member, save Ensign Chekov.  In addition to his arthritis Kirk’s memory is starts to fail him. 

A rapidly ageing engineer!

Despite his condition McCoy works tirelessly for a cure, to the annoyance of Ensign Chekov who feels that Doctor has taken so many samples that he may run out.  Young Mr. Chekov does as he is told despite having seemly little displayed empathy.  McCoy had found nothing in the local environment to account for it.  Earlier Spock had noted a comet that had recently passed by.  Kirk had decided to have the ship take a look at.  When they find it they noticed that it gave off an odd type of radiation.  They found their source of the problem.  

Kirk's old age problems

Kirk’s memory problems start to become a huge issue for the ship.  He continues to give orders to Mr. Spock and Mr. Sulu then forgets that he gave them and issues the orders again.  Kirk demands his Yeoman give him documents that he has already signed.  Most dangerously he gave Lt. Uhura and order to use Code 2 in an important communication with Starfleet.  Earlier they had received a report from Starfleet intelligence informing them that the nearby Romulans have managed to crack Code 2.  He backs off after the Lieutenant reminds him. 

Does Chekov's body contain the cure?

The senior officers were going to simply work around Captain Kirk’s new and hopefully temporary disability.  In the first season episode “The Enemy Within” relieving the Captain even for a legitimate disability was established as having a strong negative effect on crew morale.  This has stuck me as strange but that is what we are told.  Commodore Stocker doesn’t agree and then confronts Mr. Spock.  Stocker tries to get Spock to assume command because, unlike the Captain, his condition isn’t compromising him.  Spock tells him that is not true and begins to list all the ways he is compromised.  The Commodore then reasons with Spock that if he is compromised then the Captain must be also and reminded him of regulation.  With that Spock agrees to hold the hearing.

Doctors comparing notes

During the hearing Captain Kirk is belligerent.  He thinks the whole thing is just a waste of time and cooked up by Commodore Stocker to get him to Starbase 10 sooner.  However while he is defending himself his condition becomes more apparent as he forgets important facts, such as what planet they orbit, mid-discussion.  The committee finds him impaired and relieves him of command.  Since both Mr. Spock and Mr. Scott have the same condition as Kirk, Commodore Stocker announces instead of allowing Lt. Sulu, a junior officer, to take command he pulls his rank as a flag officer and takes command himself.

Kirk's command challenged

Once Stocker assumes command it is clear the committee made a huge error.  Kirk’s failing memory would have served the crew far better than Stocker’s failing intelligence.  Despite having outwitted Spock earlier in the episode in order to get a hearing, the Commodore orders Mr. Sulu to head straight to Starbase 10.  When Sulu informs Stocker that such a course would take them right into the Romulan Neutral Zone, he says he understands that but he wants to get there as fast as he can.  Stocker reasons Romulans won’t mind, and if they show up he’ll talk to them.

In his condition still more qualified than the man in red!

When they get to the Romulan Neutral Zone, the Enterprise is surrounded by three Birds of Prey and fired upon.   The Commodore is convinced that all he has to do is talk to them and the Romulans will let them go, Uhura says she is still trying to raise them but Romulans aren't big on communicating.  Sulu backs her point explaining to the Commodore that they faced off against them before.  The Commodore concludes he has to surrender.  Chekov then reminds him that Romulans aren’t known for taking prisoners.

While the Commodore was flying the Enterprise to certain death so he could get to his new job on time, other things were going on in different areas of the ship.  First Dr. Wallace makes a pass at Kirk but Kirk rejects her because he thinks her advances are due to sympathy or an old man fetish he is not sure which.  Personally I think Kirk’s dementia is at it again.  In addition he joins McCoy and Spock to pick their brains to search for a cure.   When reminiscing about what happened on the planet they remembered Chekov screaming like a 5-year-old girl.  The screaming meant, according to McCoy, Chekov was terrified and full of adrenaline.  McCoy then remembers that in the 21^st century medical researchers were using increased does of adrenaline to treat radiation but it was abandoned when a better alternative was developed called hyronalin.   McCoy develops a theory that they could create a mixture of artificial adrenaline as a cure.  Spock and Dr. Wallace work on McCoy’s formula.  When finished they have something that will either cure or kill.  Kirk demands to be the first to try it so he can save the ship from the Commodore’s incompetence.   

Near death

They give Kirk the formula and he twists and turns but is ultimately cured.  He runs to the bridge with his youth restored.  As Kirk enters the bridge clearly physically all right the crew instantly follows his commands despite the fact he hasn’t been formally reinstated yet.  Kirk turns to Uhura and orders her to communicate in Code 2, this is concerning because Code 2 is the broken code that was also one the first hints of Kirk’s memory failing.  However Kirk is not failing now and he is using Code 2 on purpose realizing the Romulans are listening in.  He sends a message to Starfleet that they are all about to die so they will have to use the newly installed corbomite device so they better prevent any ships from entering this area of space for at least a year.  The Romulans pick up the message and back off, this allow the Enterprise to pull a surprise escape.  The moral of the story is there is not a single problem that old age inflicts that youth can’t cure.  

Additional thoughts: This was a very fun episode with all the actors turning in an amazing performance particularly William Shatner and DeForest Kelly.   The only thing that bothered me about the main plot was it’s finally resolution.  Mainly Chekov was immune because he was a coward who couldn’t be in a room a dead body.  This kind of insulting to Chekov’s character and Koenig himself described it as the writers as having him act like a child.  Also if fear pumping adrenaline is the cure wouldn’t both the away team and the lost science expedition have been cured the moment they noticed their bodies were aging rapidly? That would surly terrify me.  However terror apparently doesn’t do enough to beat back the disease for the already inflicted.  Still there is something of classic science fiction horror, of young explorers seeing this comet in the sky unaware it was going to bring death upon them.

Stupid place for a mirror

The Wallace/Kirk romance, in a Star Trek book I once read Dr. McCoy joked about how many old lady friends Kirk had and how funny it was that they all end up somehow on the Enterprise.   There comes a point in the episode where Kirk finds out that Wallace’s late husband was some twenty-five years older than she was.  Kirk then accuses of her of only being interested in old and dying men.  This pointless and adds nothing to the episode.  Wallace had already dated Kirk at one point and was already flirting with him before the symptoms started to manifest themselves.  If Kirk’s rejection is based on his own failing mental stability that is not made clear.

Bad plot point

Okay I really wanted to like Commodore Stocker.  He was so nice throughout most of the episode even his first challenge to Kirk’s command seems out of genuine compassion.  Then he goes and flies the ship straight into the Romulan Neutral Zone, because he wants to get to his new command earlier.  Granted he did state that the medical facilities are more advanced on Starbase 10, but come on.  I don’t buy “well he is desk officer and doesn’t know how to fly a ship.”  I have never been in the Navy but if suddenly found myself in command of one of their ships I think I would be smart enough not to sail into enemy waters just so I could get somewhere quicker.  In the end he and Kirk have buddy moment over the differences between starbases and starships.  I want to know why he isn’t in the brig facing charges. 

If I was Kirk or McCoy I would have thought that the aging illness would make me paranoid about growing older in the future.  I would always wonder if what happened to me then represented some kind of preview for myself in old age.  I guess McCoy can always monitor himself and Kirk has McCoy. 

Where the hell was McCoy’s staff?  He is the chief medical officer, so where the other medical officers?  The only one we saw was Nurse Chapel.  Now I know McCoy has other doctors working for him we saw one of them, who was also another one of Kirk’s exs, in “The Dagger of the Mind.”  If we can remember strategy from “The Corbomite Maneuver” then I fail to see why we can’t remember McCoy’s assistants.  Wallace and Spock had to mix the formula.  Wallace was a guest and Spock was a patient.  Dr. McCoy should not approve so much leave time in the future.

FINAL GRADE 4 of 5