TOS: The Enemy Within

             The episode opens with Sulu holding a dog in a double unicorn costume (a horn at each end, google it if you have to) with a rainbow tarp in the background as the captain supervises the collection of geological samples. A crewman is hurt in a fall (and somehow survives the whole episode, a first???) and transported back, but there is some sort of transporter malfunction, so of course the logical next thing to do is beam the captain back to the ship with the broken transporter. And of course this ends with Kirk split into has wimpy compassionate side and his animalistic rage side.

             While compassion Kirk (CK) is relaxing in his quarters rage Kirk (RK) assaults yeoman Rand in her quarters, but she escapes after scratching his cheek. RK then assaults but doesn't kill the same crewman who was injured at the beginning of the episode (wow, this guy is lucky to survive two brushes with death). Scotty figures out that the double unicorn dog has been split into a good and evil version and Spock puts it all together, there is an impostor! This whole time Sulu is stuck with the away team on the planet below as the temperature drops rapidly below survivable. 

             CK orders the crew to search for RK and almost forgets to tell them to set phasers to stun as Spock has decided kinda out of the blue that if RK is hurt or killed it will kill CK. CK out thinks RK and there is a struggle in engineering, but RK ends up strapped down in the med bay while they figure things out. Somewhere around here Spock decides RK is losing, "the force of will," and that he will lose his ability to command. All I could think of was the matrix of leadership from transformers, and if Optimus loses it, on noes! In the fight in engineering RK blasts a hole in some vital part the Scotty later tells them is the reason the transporter malfunctioned. Take that chronological order!

             The final crisis of the episode revolves around trying to fix the transporter to both recombine RK and CK and save Sulu and the away team. Of course no challenge is too great for the combined talents of Scotty and Spock and they manage to slap it together just in time for a test on the two double unicorn dogs. This results in one dead double unicorn dog and the first use of the line, "He's dead Jim!" But don't worry, Spock is sure it will work as long as the subject understands what is happening, it is just the shock that killed the dog. Lets stop for a second, I am an EMT and this is not how shock works. Shock is a physiological reaction, not a psychological one. But since Spock is never wrong it works just fine on the captain and we call all get back to business as usual.

             A few notes on this episode, throughout most of it the way to recognize RK is that he is sweating and has some black eye liner. How can we be sure he isn't just going through some strange goth/jock phase? Also I am pretty sure this it he first episode where Kirk hasn't gotten any crew killed, well done! Also, why doesn't the Enterprise have shuttle craft yet?

             Reviewy section: Already TOS is making episodes about it's made up technology failing and almost dooming them all. This one definitely has some Shatner over acting, but in the context of him being split into id and ego or whatever it worked pretty well. I am going to have to take off a point or two however for what felt like 5 minutes or so of filler in the third act.

5 out of 10