IT IS TIME FOR THE CUTE FURRY CREATURES FROM HELL

 

Episode Title:  The Trouble with Tribbles

Air Date: 12/29/1967

Written by David Gerrold

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”        Nichelle Nichols as Lieutenant Nyota Uhura          Eddie Paskey as Lieutenant Leslie                 Mike Howden as Lieutenant Rowe        Roger Holloway as Lieutenant Lemli                        Frank Da Vinci as Lieutenant Brent       Bill Blackburn as Lieutenant Hadley    Paul Baxley as Ensign Freeman       Walter Koenig as Ensign Pavel Chekov                 Jeannie Malone as unnamed Yeoman  William Frederick Knight as Crewman Moody            Steve Hershon  as unnamed Security Guard     David L. Ross as unnamed Security Guard     Bobby Bass as unnamed Security Guard     Edwin Reimers as Admiral Fitzpatrick                Bob Orrison as unnamed Klingon                     William Schallert as Under-Secretary Nilz Baris     William Campbell as Captain Koloth         Stanley Adams as Cyrano Jones     Whit Bissell as Station Manager Lurry                  Michael Pataki as Korax            Charlie Brill as Arne Darvin         Guy Raymond as unnamed Trader         Richard Antoni as unnamed Klingon                     Dick Crockett  as unnamed Klingon                    

Ships and Space Stations: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, unnamed Klingon K't'inga-class battle cruiser, K-7 Space Station

Planets:  Sherman’s Planet

My Spoiler filled summary and review: The episode begins with a debriefing on the mission at hand with Kirk, Spock, and Chekov.  This establishes two things for the viewer.  First it sets the stakes.  In a great call back to the Klingons' first appearance, the three discuss the Orgainian Peace Treaty and its terms with how to deal with disputed territory and planets.  When a planet is disputed the right to colonize is granted to the power that can show it can demonstrate a stronger ability to develop the planet.  The second thing the opening establishes is that Chekov’s knowledge of history is somewhat spotty through his Russian goggles.   

The Enterprise coming and looking for a fight!

Their meeting comes to an end when the red alert goes off and Lt. Uhura tells them they have a Code 1 which mean invasion.  The Enterprise flies to the station K-7 at maximum warp looking for a fight.  When they get there however they find no Klingon ships around it appears to be a false alarm.  When Lt. Uhura raises Manger Lurry, he offers to explain.  Kirk is enraged and tells him he better prepare to do more than that. 

Kirk and Spock beam over and when they do they are introduced to a Federation Under-secretary.  This man is a little weasel name Baris, and he has a little brown-nosing assistant named Darvin.  Baris announces that he was the one to order the alarm.  His reason was he has a special grain called quadrotriticale.  It is the only crop that can grow on Sherman’s Planet and it is vital to the colony’s success.  The problem is Baris feels there is a likelihood that the Klingons could try to sabotage their efforts and he has no guards for his valuable product.  So instead of just requesting some guards like a responsible official he decides to falsely pull the Federation fire alarm.  This enrages Kirk that he would divert a starship for some silly wheat.  However, with some encouragement from Spock, he agrees to place some guards for the good of the colony.    Kirk also authorizes some shore leave for his crew. 

The unhappy Baris later goes and cries to Starfleet Command leading to Admiral Fitzpatrick to call Kirk and tell him to cooperate with more enthusiasm.  This reinforces the importance of Sherman’s Planet and the fact that Starfleet doesn’t take to pulling the Federation fire alarm that seriously.

Uhura decides to do some shopping on shore leave and brings the young Ensign Chekov along.  They run into Kirk and Spock.  Chekov then horrifies his Captain with his knowledge of quadrotriticale, making the Kirk wonder if everyone has heard about it but him.  While the two young officers get a drink a slimy merchant named Cyrano Jones tries to sell some trinkets to the bartender.  Jones comes off as a Harry Mudd-lite type of person, who the crew of the Enterprise just dispatched last week. 

Would you trust this man with anything? Really?

Jones pulls out a cute little creature he calls a “tribble.”  When the bartender sees how taken Uhura becomes with the little guy he is convinced to buy a number from Jones.  Jones gives Uhura her tribble explaining to the bartender that once she shows it around he won’t be able to keep out all the business he will get.

The good Lieutenant is getting more than she bargained for!

The red alert goes off again and this time there really is a Klingon ship.  As the Enterprise readies for battle, Kirk calls over K-7 to get another surprise in a day of surprises.  The Klingon Captain and his First Officer are already there.  I, as a viewer, am also surprised.  How did Captain Koloth and First Officer Korax get over there so quickly?  The Enterprise went on alert right away.  Did the Klingons never raise their shields?  When Kirk goes over to meet with Koloth the Klingon Captain claims he just wants to have shore leave rights and Kirk grants them.  This sends the Baris into a frenzy which makes Kirk happy. 

The Klingon Captain and his First Officer

Elsewhere Lt. Uhura is learning about the trouble with tribbles as her tribble gave birth to ten babies.  This doesn’t seem to be a big deal it just means that ten more crew members have pets or nine as McCoy just want study his. 

Realizing the tensions between Starfleet and the Klingons could flare up at any moment Kirk orders Scotty to take shore leave with the some of the crew in order to keep the peace.  Scotty just wants to read his technical journals and not hang out on a Starbase but he obeys orders. While there the Klingon First Officer Korax starts to talk crap about humans and Starfleet.  Chekov wants to slug him especially after Korax goes off on Captain Kirk, but Scotty stops him.  However when Korax starts to belittle the USS Enterprise, Scotty turns around and slugs the Klingon himself.   This causes a massive brawl that only ends when Starfleet security shows up to arrest everyone.  Kirk cancels shore leave for both ships, and we get an amusing scene where poor Mr. Scott has to explain to his Captain that he caused the brawl. 

Tribbles are everywhere!  In the halls, in Captain Kirk’s chair, and all over the bridge tribbles are making their presence felt.  The only thing Dr. McCoy can tell is that they are born pregnant and have a nicer personality than Spock.  Spock is happy that they don’t talk too much.

Throw down!

Baris believes that Jones is a Klingon agent set to destroy their operations on Sherman’s Planet. Kirk and Spock reluctantly integrate Jones.  Jones just says he is a passing businessman.  Jones seems somewhat unaware of the trouble that tribbles cause and sees their rapid breading as nothing more than a good way to maintain his stock. 

Okay, this is getting a bit ridiculous!

The tribbles continue their trouble on the Enterprise for they have now gotten into the food remixers.   Kirk realizes that if they could do that then they could also have gotten to the grain storage.  He calls Baris and Lurry for an emergency gathering at the very grain storage.  When Kirk opens it up he is then buried in tribbles.  Baris is now beyond enraged he threatens Kirk’s career, but Kirk isn’t moved.  Spock notices that many of the tribbles are dead.  This means Kirk is standing in tribble corpses, which is really gross.  Kirk isn’t lost however he orders McCoy, who had just now has thought that they should stop feeding the tribbles, to investigate with Spock to the cause of the grain-eating tribbles’ death. 

"I get to say 'he's dead, Jim' a thousand times!"

Kirk calls a meeting with Larry and Baris, to which Koloth crashes to demand an apology.  During the meeting we have it confirmed that Klingons and tribbles don’t like each other.  Klingons tend to act like elephants that have seen a mouse, where tribbles drop their soft purr and start to sequel.  At this point Baris’s assistant Darvin walks in and the tribbles in Kirk’s hand squeal as if they have seen a Klingon.  McCoy’s tricorder confirms it and Kirk uses the tribbles to coerce a confession out of Darvin that it was he who poisoned the grain.  The false human is taken away, Kirk tells Koloth where to stick it, and Kirk also comes to the conclusion that he might actually like tribbles.

Exposed

Back on the Enterprise Kirk is surprised to find his ship tribble-free.  When asked how it was done, Scotty confessed that he used his skill with the transporter to send all of them over to the Klingon ship just before they warped out.    

Additional thoughts: A parasitic species threatens to eat up the resources of the Enterprise, the Klingons have a high ranking spy in the Federation government, and colony threatened with a sadistic form of starvation.  Yet this episode is generally viewed as one of the lighter and sillier episodes.  That is not by accident for “The Trouble with Tribbles” gives off that feel, it’s not a bad thing just an observation.

Kirk has a great line in this when he say to Uhura “Too much of anything, even love, is not necessarily a good thing.” I find myself using this quote often.  I hold it right up there with Spock’s lines about understanding without approving and having not as nice as wanting.  Kirk has other great lines in this series but I really enjoy this one.

In one of the rare instances that I checked Spock’s math I discover of course he is right.  In this case about how many tribbles there would be after a certain amount of time.  At first I thought he was wrong but then I realized I needed to multiple a factor of eleven and not ten.

This episode contains one of the best examples of my favorite Captain Kirk idioms.  “Now as a Captain I want two things done.  The first thing I am going to say will be inspiring and directly to the point so you all know who is in charge.  Then the second thing will be some silly and ridiculous little thing to let you know I am person too.  Please close that door so more dead tribbles will land on my head.”  I like this almost as much as Kirk telling machines to kill themselves.

All of the Kirk/Scotty interactions were great.  I love the look on Kirk’s face when he is under the impression that the fight with the Klingons was started by the crew trying to defend his honor.  Then how that same expression changes when he learns the fight had nothing to do with him but the Enterprise.  I believe for a second he was jealous of his own ship.  Silly really seeing as how Kirk could be come just as defensive about his ship as Scotty.  After all as he said in the last episode, “She is a beautiful lady and we love her.” 

Who started it?

I really enjoyed the scene between Jones and Spock.  The fact that Jones can’t understand Spock because his simple minded brain isn’t fast enough to keep up was worth the entire episode.  Spock, of course, just adapts but it was fun to watch none the less.

Oh but the poor tribbles!  Kirk was horrified when he thought Mr. Scott transported them into space, but when he sends them to the Klingon ship is that really better. The Klingons and tribbles hate each other.  They're the only ones that tribbles do hate.  That is where Mr. Scott sent them?  I mean it’s funny to think of the horrified Klingons but did the tribbles deserve that?  

FINAL GRADE 5 OF 5