The first two part episode is also the first clip show much to it's detriment. The new parts about Spock betraying everything he holds dear for no apparent reason are tense and interesting making this seem like it is destined for great things. But the unedited clip segments from the rejected pilot are hard to take. I guess it wouldn't have been possible to make this a one and a half part episode, but they should have tried.
Things get going with the Enterprise arriving at Starbase 11, Spock has received a message from his former captain requesting he stop by. But it turns out there never was a message and captain Pike is an invalid trapped in a broken body only able to signal yes or no through a light. For once Kirk's trust in Spock seems to be misplaced as Spock steals the ship along with McCoy and the wheelchair bound Pike. Spock programs the computer to only respond to him and fly them directly to the only forbidden planet of Talos IV. It is so forbidden that going there is the only reason starfleet will sentence someone to death. Kirk traps Spock into rescuing him by flying towards the Enterprise in a shuttlecraft (sorry I missed it at the top, but this is the first appearance of a shuttle in TOS) with limited fuel and going beyond safe return range forcing Spock to pick up him and Commodore Mendez.
Before Kirk can arrive Spock surrenders himself to McCoy for mutiny. Kirk and Mendez setup a review board to investigate Spock's actions, but Spock demands an immediate court martial, but they need three command officers! Fortunately for them starfleet had too much heart to take away Pikes rank of captain so off we go with the trial. Spock pulls some sort of BS legal move of tricking Mendez into asking him why he did what he did which apparently means Spock is entitled to enter whatever form of testimony or evidences he wants no matter what. Which incidentally is also where the episode takes a nose dive.
The kind of testimony it turns out Spock wants to give is a showing of the pilot episode on a view screen, and I do mean the whole pilot. To it's credit both Mendez and Kirk object that what they are seeing could not have possibly been recorded at the time which I answer, "damn right!" I know there is a reason in Part II, but so many shows/movies have people watching recordings of things that obviously weren't recorded at the time and this is the only time I have seen a character object to it. For the purposes of the trial all it apparently takes is Pike flashing once for, "yes, this is actually what happened."
I am not going to recap the pilot here, if you want to see that scroll down on the page, but what I will discuss here is now lazy it felt to just say it was 13 years ago and that is why everything is so odd. For instance they didn't remove the sequence of Spock grabbing a vibrating blue leaf and grinning like a maniac. After watching about half the pilot they receive a message from starfleet saying they are violating the law by receiving a transmission from Talos IV, the very pilot I was just complaining about. The episode ends with Spock insisting we tune in for the second half of the pilot and Kirk doing the most reasonable thing he has done all episode, order Spock locked up.
Review bit: I remember watching this episode as a kid and really liking it, but then again I hadn't watched the pilot this episode so heavily steals from just a week before which may have made those segments more watchable. But as is the episode has some cool tense parts and the first court martial, but also so much of the bland pilot.
5 out of 10
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