Ah, now this feels refreshing! This is the Star Trek I remember. The crew is right, Spock is emotionless, Kirk is captain, and Sulu has his own sexy personal yeoman. A few thing seem odd to my TNG trained eyes, especially when it comes to lighting. TNG used very bright, even overhead lighting resembling an office. TOS lighting is much more dramatic, lots of shadows on faces and emphasized eyes. Also wow, they don't seem to care if their shots are in focus. There are numerous times where one half of a shot reverse shot sequence is totally out of focus.
Unlike the pilot this episode goes out of it's way to show that Spock is different from the rest of the crew. While Kirk and McCoy are busy getting a crewman killed down on the planet below Spock is in command up on the bridge. After reprimanding Uhura (who responds by flirting with him LOL alternate timeline) the news of the dead crewman comes over the comms and Spock is unbothered which clearly upsets Uhura. Then later in the episode the salt vampire attempts to steal salt from Spock, but is unsuccessful because, "[his] ancestors spawned in a different sea." Also his blood is green.
While this was the first aired episode of Star Trek, it wasn't the first filmed and this pays off. Shatner already seems comfortable as Captain Kirk, and that gives the whole thing a very comforting routineness hard to pull off in a first episode. Already you can see the Kirk/McCoy/Spock dynamic developing as well.
Ok, the Sulu bit up top was a bit of tease given what we now know about the esteemed George Takei's orientation, but I couldn't help it. When the salt vampire first makes it's way onto the ship the first person it stalks is beautiful female yeoman delivering a plate of vegetables and some sort of food cubes to some lucky officer. It turns out the officer in question is none other the Sulu who at this point apparently works in the botanical lab rather than on the bridge. A quick sidenote on the botanical lab scene, how funny is the hand in a pink glove decorated to look like a flower! Also, food cubes! Kirk vigorously eats a plate of them on the bridge and then hands the dirty plate to another yeoman on the bridge apparently waiting just to take his plate away.
Review time! The Man Trap isn't one of those episodes that is going to be remembered as a classic, but it is also far from the embarrassment I am concerned about in season 3. The plot and characters hold together well and the improved effects and supporting acting roles really make this a solid start on my journey through TOS.
6 out of 10
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