The Menagerie, Part II

DVD, Star Trek S1 (The Menagerie, Part II)

This one is still as good as ever, and I enjoyed it just as much as when it was called 'The Cage'! It's essentially the back half of the first pilot with only the occasional interjection by members of the hearing to remind us that they're watching along with us. It gets a bit weird when we get to the parts where the Talosians are watching Pike and Vina, Kirk and company are watching them watching, and we're watching them, watching them! You almost expect some kind of feedback loop where the reels suddenly explode off their spindles and the whole universe grinds to a halt. We also have rudimentary opening and closing scenes set aboard the Enterprise, but for the most part we're treated to a retelling of that great pilot, although it is clever how they zoom in or out of the picture to go in and out of the hearing room, almost as punctuation to the story. No doubt it was to facilitate advert breaks, and you could tell when they were about to come out of the recording or as they were going back in, because the double exposure of the projected image was much more grainy and dark than the perfectly clear original transfer. The recap at the beginning had a selection of scenes, but there was an odd moment when Spock's charges are read to him, with Spock, Kirk and Mendez seemingly on a black background and the Commodore speaking quite robotically, so I think that must have been newly filmed, not a clip from Part I.

I later put it down to Mendez being an illusion throughout this episode (ironic that he should be a Talosian projection, since actor Malachi Throne did the voices for them in 'The Cage,' and proves to be their voice again, in a, shall we say, 'manner of speaking'!), and, apparently, much of the previous, though he speaks pretty normally the rest of the time - maybe former commander of Starbase 11, Commodore Stone, was also an illusion of the Talosians, which would explain why he disappeared so quickly after 'Court Martial'… I had forgotten this little rug pull, but had unfortunately been reading the background details to Part I on Memory Alpha, spoiling it for me, but it remains a clever twist in the tale, although the whole idea of having him there to keep Kirk watching the events sent by the Talosians, keeping the Captain's mind on the events so he didn't dismiss Spock without a hearing, was a bit of a stretch. Why not make Kirk think he's still on Starbase 11 with Spock there, too, or that Spock hasn't done anything wrong. Or, as Kirk said, Spock should have simply come clean with his Captain and friend, and explained everything. But I suppose it was more effective to show rather than tell. Of course that doesn't explain why Starfleet was so accommodating about the incident, suspending the death penalty in this case for extenuating circumstances. I get that it's there to stop the curious from bothering the Talosians and trying to learn their powers of illusion, which would destroy their world as it did the Talosians (in their view), but it still seems excessive when the Federation doesn't have any other death penalties.

The episode is astoundingly well written ('The Cage,' that is - not that 'The Menagerie' isn't, but there's not a lot of new material), and still looks great, feels fresh and daring, while holding a lot of history. It's amazing the executives found this to be the weaker and preferred the inferior 'Where No Man Has Gone Before,' which was a lot less exciting, with fewer great characters. Those in the first pilot continue to carry a lot of weight and interest, especially Dr. Boyce in his few scenes, but also Number One, with her silvery blue fingernails and slightly distant look. It's also pretty wild that a change in hairstyle and colour could create two such different characters as Number One and Nurse Chapel, and it's only a shame that she's not in the episode, as that would have been another in-joke that might have broken the bank, but it would have been fascinating to see the nurse comment about Number One! If we don't see Chapel, neither do we see any other main cast, unless you count Mr. Leslie, loyally working away at his station on the Bridge, but I don't recall even Uhura in the background, let alone Sulu or Scotty, and even McCoy is absent from the hearing. It's a quiet audience of Kirk, Spock, Mendez and the crippled Pike, and I think he only ever answered "Yes," during the whole episode! Ironically the end credits are duplicated from Part I, so everyone's credited, even if they don't show up. It made me wonder if Scotty could have been an Engineer during Pike's time, or it he'd have been too young. It also makes me wonder if we'll see any of the old Enterprise crew under Pike, in 'Discovery' - if they could pull off Dr. Boyce I'd love to see him again as I think he was one of the best that never was, the actor holding a lot of depth in his delivery and attitude.

If the ending of 'The Menagerie' is a little suspect and gives the episode short shrift (apart from the last moments which I'll go into shortly), it was at least continuing the tradition from 'The Cage,' which also gave us left field conclusions: the main one being that as Pike threatens to detonate an overloading laser gun, the Talosians get around to assimilating the human database and lo and behold, they realise that humans have a 'unique' hatred of captivity. Well, there you are then, of course we won't keep you, you'd better be on your way! If it had been the Talosian facing death, it would have made more sense, as they would come up with any reason to comply, but Pike had already said Vina and the Keeper were free to go, as a sign of what humans are really like, so it didn't have that excuse. The other misstep was Vina's true form being higgledy-piggledy because the Talosians had never seen a human before and 'didn't know how to fit her back together'! They look practically the same as humans: face, eyes, shoulders, arms, etc. So why wouldn't they be able to extrapolate a form similar to their own? Of course it adds a bittersweet parting for Vina, and adds immensely to her character, while once again showing off the wonders of the aliens' powers, and I wouldn't have wanted to lose it, in spite of its illogic.

If the ending from 'The Cage' has the flaws of a necessarily quick wrap-up, 'The Menagerie' adds some greatness, with an artistic flourish to reuse some of the old footage from the episode (in the same way as 'All Good Things…' had a young Riker at the end of 'TNG'), by having the Keeper speak to Kirk via the monitor - because they use 'thought transmissions,' the Keeper's lips didn't need to be synched to some new lines, so it's an expert addendum, with the final brilliance being the genius reuse of the original ending where Vina gets an illusion of Pike to stay with her, but this time it's the real Pike, enjoying the illusory body the Talosians give him, two paralysed or damaged peopled together finding a new lease of life, and it doesn't even undo what happened with Vina taking the fake Pike back to the caves in 'The Cage' because that was years ago and no doubt she'd prefer the real man, even if he was in a false body. So it's a sweet moment of resolution to a story that had originally taken place thirteen years in Trek's history (or a couple, in real world production terms), adding another layer of joy to the proceedings and capping it off very satisfyingly. The two-parter also set the precedent (not the least for having two-parters!), of revisiting situations, characters or places previously seen in Trek, something we can be grateful for!

In reality, we don't see much of the titular menagerie, even less than in the original episode (which might be for the best, as they weren't the greatest creature designs), but it leaves much to the imagination, and I especially love how both titles come from the same line of dialogue by Pike: "We're in a menagerie; a cage," he tells Vina. It could almost have been the Nexus for its ability to take you to any life or situation, imagined or real, not least the parallels drawn by both Kirk, Picard and Pike all having an affinity for horses! And the effects continue to impress, especially the powered up mounted laser that blasts away at the rocky entrance to the Talosians underground lair, flashing and groaning in a most effective light and sound show. Re-watching the scenes from the pilot also help you notice little things you hadn't thought about before, such as Pike's crew having proper utility belts with loops or tags in which to slot the Communicators and lasers, instead of the brown belts and velcro we'd seen this season - I really do love the aesthetic from this period, from the muted uniform colours to the design of the weapons and even the coloured lights on black, shiny panels aboard ship. I really wish 'Discovery' was going to be true to that aesthetic since they're in this time period and Trek has always been a period piece, so why would you ignore the established look, even if a little tweaking was required to round off the rough edges. We'll see, maybe they'll be closer than we've seen of initial designs…

I felt Vina was another really good performance, running the gamut from fear, to torture as we pity her horrible screams in the punishment, to jealousy and desperation for Pike to play the game. The most pitiable moment is when we see that she accepts the Talosians' ownership of her as they've broken her down, but being the hero, Pike doesn't kowtow even with these professions of gloom, and remains fired up in his dedication to escape, though naturally he does fall for her at the same time. I wonder why the Keeper actually spoke to him, for once, instead of keeping up the distance and using thought transmission, as before? Was it an attempt to get him onside with more civilised behaviour, since he reacted so badly to their objectifying him as a captive creature and talking about, rather than to, him? I also thought it was exceedingly well written when he and the Keeper talk at cross purposes, both saying what they want to say, but ignoring what the other says, the Keeper trying to distract him from his deductions by telling the story of how Vina came to be there, while Pike, in interrogatory attitude, pries into the fact the Keeper was shocked by his violent reaction. Naturally, the important thing is that Spock is off the hook by the end, trust with Kirk regained. Because if he'd go that far for his former commander, just think how far he'd go for his current Captain, something he'd prove with his 'needs of the many' saving of the Enterprise with the loss of his own life in 'Star Trek II.' It wasn't specifically for Kirk, but it shows the deep loyalty and self-sacrificial nature, first demonstrated here, where he put both career and life at risk so Pike could have his back. The height of heroism.

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