Where No Man Has Gone Before

Producer: Gene Roddenberry
Director: James Goldstone
Writer: Samuel A. Peeples
Music: Alexander Courage

Principals: Kirk, Spock, Sulu (kind of), Scott
Guests: Lt. Commander Gary Mitchell, Dr. Piper, Dr. Elizabeth Dehner, Lt Kelso, Yeoman Smith, Lt Alden

Plot Summary
The Enterprise, on it's way out of the galaxy, intercepts a ship's log recorder from the U.S.S. Valiant, a ship lost two centuries before. Spock interprets what's left of the log files. The ship suffered some kind of accident, it's Captain then desperately wanted to know everything he could about ESP, then for some reason, blew the ship up.

The Enterprise proceeds and encounters some kind of bizarre force field/energy barrier/nasty electrical storm that forces them to turn back having caused heavy damage to the ship's engines. It also kills several crew members and gives Lt. Commander Mitchell (a friend of Kirk's since Academy days) a pair of funky glowing eyes.

The eyes turn out to be a physical manifestation of Mitchell's new, and rapidly growing, ESPer powers. As his power increases, so does his arrogance and disdain for human beings.  Spock soon voices the opinion that Mitchell should be tossed out the nearest airlock while they can still get away with it.

Instead Kirk, compassionate guy that he is, decides to maroon his buddy on the barren planet of Delta Vega, home to an automated mining facility where the ore transports show up every twenty years to pick up the proceeds.

Mitchell, now more powerful than ever, kills Kelso, knocks out everyone else, then walks away with the beautiful Dr. Dehner, now also a super ESPer. Kirk goes after them with a phaser rifle. There's the inevitable showdown (including a lovely fistfight and Kirk's first torn shirt of the series) where Dehner uses her powers to help Kirk and Mitchell winds up squashed by a big paper maché rock in a grave he meant for Kirk. The universe is saved from a race of childish super-ESPers.

The moral: we're not grown up enough for that kind of power. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Comments
The second pilot, there are some differences between this episode and the rest of the first season: the uniforms are a bit different and there are no red shirts yet, no monologue over the opening sequence and the music has a slightly different arrangement, McCoy isn't around yet, we see higher up in the halls and there are some odd camera angles at work to make things a little more dramatic (at least, I think that was the intention), Sulu works in the science department, the phasers aren't those we come to love but much more 50s SF, the crew is still mostly on the pasty white side, and McCoy isn't around yet. There are more if you look hard.

But the writing is already solid as is the acting (if you don't mind a little overacting here and there on Shatner's part). Even then, Hollywood was typically producing flat, streamlined characters to keep things as simple as possible for the audience, but the characters here were a little more real than was typical at the time, or at any time since.

Pacing is excellent. We start in a tense situation which everyone is looking forward too - that old spirit of adventure - and have a quick buildup to an emergency. Then comes the fall out and from there a more gradual buildup to the final crisis and showdown. Along the way, we're introduced to the basic workings of a universe. It's action oriented, intelligent SF for the masses, baby, in a future so bright that shades should be provided.

A note on Spock: he's still a bit under development here. Issuing orders, he tends to be a bit harsh. We learn that he has a human ancestor within moments of the show beginning - yes, later that ancestor turns out to be his mother. No emotions, yet he can smile sarcastically. But he's odd and kind of grows on you. Give him time.

Rating: Four stars.

Favourite Line
Mitchell, in his first use of the echoing, godlike voice: "Didn't I say you'd better be good to me?" Kirk gives his WTF face and then everyone pretends it didn't happen.