This Side of Paradise

DVD, Star Trek S1 (This Side of Paradise)

If the 24th Century-set series had come first, and this original, 23rd Century-set series had been the sequel, you could see Kirk's comments on mankind not being meant for paradise as a pointed jab at the utopian ideal of 'TNG,' where Earth is said to be a paradise of no crime, no want and no troubles, all the conflict arising from outside forces, but essentially meaning humanity had crafted a workable, everyday perfection to living. But this was not the case, 'TOS' came first (hence the 'original' moniker), so what does Kirk mean? I think he's right about one thing, that without ambition and desire to improve, Earthlings stagnate, seen most powerfully in Sandoval's sudden comprehension of three years of wasted time as he and his colony have lived in perfect health under the influence of the Triffids, sorry, the Spores, and their benevolent, but unnatural symbiotic happy pill attitude when they could have been striving for a hard-won, bootstraps and braces success, with all the failures and setbacks such a venture would mean, but in the building would have also built up their character and pioneering spirit, which must have been what they wanted, otherwise why leave the safe, comfortable planet of home? I don't think we really got an answer to why they wanted to come out into the unknown and start a colony, I just assume it's the same sense of adventure as that which prompted Starfleet to send out its feelers into the Galaxy through starship missions, and what Trek is all about.

From visual impression I didn't think the colony was some lush, green success even under the peaceful guidance of the Spores, since the location, though pleasingly rural, and making excellent contrast with the technological tidiness of the manmade travelling haven that is the Enterprise, had the look of a dry land - the grass wasn't a gorgeous, succulent green, but patchy and dried up, but it does fit with the theme of the colonists seeing things as they wish them, rather than as they are. To some degree you could say that there was nothing wrong with the cohabitation of human and Spore (reminding me of midiclorians since they also inhabited the body and had some effect from the inside!), the people were happy, they were clearly working and creating their food, so it's really only the fact it was not with their consent, and that they had no ills to battle and had become comfortable with this level of existence where there was no character-building adversity. But would it have been that different if the Spores hadn't come? Such story points are not sufficiently explored as it's more about Kirk singlehandedly dealing with total ship-wide mutiny, and Spock dealing with a sudden lack of inhibition, than the rights and wrongs of the Spores imprisoning the people with happiness.

Where did the Spores come from and how did they get into space? I can't imagine them building rockets! I have to say that they were an excellent design and manufacture, totally believable, their simple movements so sinister, such as when Sulu unwittingly sits within striking distance of a plant and it curls round, but he's up and about before it has time to puff its petals at him. Sinister contentment, a complete lack of care for the working of day to day life, Spock even mentions the 'happy pill,' and don't forget this was made in the Sixties when the drugs revolution was still fresh in the mind - it's got to be a warning against drugs. Kirk is the authority figure, the one to clamp down on 'happiness' with the need for order, the need for a society to work together to get things done. As he finds to his own discomfort, one man can't run a starship alone (though it does bring to mind Picard and Crusher in 'Remember Me' where it's just the two of them and this vast ship apparently exploring the Galaxy together!). The creepiest moment of all is when Uhura refuses a direct order, calmly admits to sabotaging the communications so they can't be used to contact Starfleet Command, then walks off the Bridge! Yet it's not as clear cut as all that because the colonists do appear to have a thriving colony and it's not like they've given up for a life of ease and downed tools, they just don't act like themselves, and are happy to imprison the whole crew on the planet, so the will of the Spores must be their wish.

The will of Captain Kirk is too strong to part him from his ship, even mind-altering substances fail to get a grip on him. I was trying to work out why he wasn't affected in the same way as his crew - when he and a couple of his crewmen are led to the Spores by Spock he is a little behind them and it does seem as if he takes less of a blast than the others. I was also thinking that he's in a heightened state of emotion because of his irritation at Spock's change in character and insubordination, so these two factors may have reduced the effects. That said, it's not until he gets a full blast to the face when he's alone on the Bridge that the beatific smile glazes over his face and he prepares to beam down and abandon ship forever (though I suspect another Starfleet vessel would have come looking for the Enterprise eventually). At that point it does seem to be his nature of intense sense of duty that forces him to realise even through the haze that he can't leave his ship, and that realisation brings anger, and the anger looses the hold of the Spores on his mind. As a child this was definitely one of the episodes that stayed in my mind, whether it was the creeping horror of something as everyday as flowers containing intelligence and wanting to control people (a device seen in many a sci-fi series, even 'Smallville' did one), or Spock giving in to his emotions and laughing, or defying Kirk, and most impressively, getting angry and responding to the goading of his Captain with full-blooded violence.

The lore of the Vulcan way is very well represented here. For Kirk, it's another week, another superior strength opponent he has to beat with a pipe (it was Khan last time), and Spock makes a few dents in the Transporter Room (though fortunately not Kirk, whom you imagine he could crush like an egg if he got hold of him, though his anger makes him wild and inaccurate). Thinking about it, 'Star Trek XI,' the first of the Kelvin Timeline films, was probably inspired by this encounter when they had the alternate Kirk insult Spock into beating him up, the difference being that this actually makes sense for the story and is arrived at logically, a need for the narrative's progression, the coolness factor of Captain and First Officer fighting only enhanced by that, but in the film it's utterly ridiculous, makes Kirk look cruel, and Spock look stupid (especially as he didn't have the influence of Spores in his mind). It's the difference between good storytelling and logic advancing the plot, and bad, where things are simply forced into the shape that is wanted for a particular story beat. Just an observation.

It's not just Spock's Vulcan strength that is well observed, his strict attitude to physical contact also shows him to be more alien than mere pointed ears could tell: he has a past with Leila (which means we can say he was on Earth six years ago, perhaps between the two five year missions he served under Captain Pike, though I've not done the maths to work out the feasibility), and she's drawn to him, but when she holds out her hand to take him to the Spores he follows, but politely declines contact. As a touch telepath that makes good sense, but it's something that was lost from 'Enterprise' onwards as Vulcans became more and more human, disappointingly. This makes it all the more powerful when he lightly brushes her cheek at the end of the episode to say goodbye, infinitely more subtle and touching than, say, the Spock/Uhura romance in the new films which deemphasise his alien nature to make him more accessible to the masses. When Kirk uses all his effort to get under Spock's skin he could have been talking about the Vulcans from 'Enterprise' and the Kelvin Timeline, saying they have not an ounce of integrity, a race of traitors, and so on, one reason I think that series failed to win over many of those who enjoyed Trek through the Eighties and Nineties (though they somewhat fixed the issue in Season 4 by bringing back the teachings of Surak). Kirk's assertion that his Father was a computer and his Mother an encyclopaedia leads to Spock telling us that, in fact, his Mother was a teacher, his Father an ambassador, so it's good for filling in some personal detail, too.

Something that really stood out to me about the episode was how good the technology looks. The Tricorder is shown in full glory, appearing somewhat sleeker and smoother than I remembered it, the Communicators get a lot of use and also give proceedings a touch of class (except when Kirk taps his to see if it's malfunctioning and it sounds very cheap and plasticky - even in three centuries you still need to bang something to make it work!), and we even get a good view of McCoy's coloured disk reader. Then there's the Bridge itself which, emptied of all personnel save Kirk (a useful shot that they were able to use to recreate a Holodeck version of in 'Relics' for old Scotty to sit in - superb!), looks so good. We're even granted a slow pan across the consoles from around Spock's station along to Uhura's, and the shiny blackness of the surfaces, coupled with the bright, colourful buttons and lights makes me wish so much that 'Discovery' had gone down that aesthetic route instead of making their style more contemporary. Uhura even left her earpiece behind on the console. There's a nice shot from inside the underside of a control panel where Spock and Kirk fix up their sound plan. In that instance you can see printed circuit boards and anachronistic technology, but that's the sort of thing you could adjust for a modern interpretation, not the bells and whistles on top. I loved that the Communicators were integral to the plan, with a discomfiting signal being broadcast across the network, irritating the crew into anger and fighting, driving out the force of the Spores.

Like 'Space Seed' immediately before it, this episode takes a while to get into. It has its moments, most notably Spock showing emotion for, I think, the first time in production order (the best way to watch), a device that had a lot of power from the way he was so reticent to do so, going against type as his stiff, formal Vulcan persona (the opposite of what they did with Zachary Quinto's version which lost all dramatic potential in his choice to embrace the human side rather than repress it - that's enough digs at the new films for one review, no matter how true they are!). The great design of the Spores, their creep factor, even the sudden poof as Spock is infected, making me jump though I knew it was coming (like Bilbo flashing a Gollum-like face in 'The Fellowship of The Ring'), or simple things like the bass of the music pounding out like a rising heartbeat when Kirk is infected on the Bridge, all enhance the experience. But, like 'Space Seed,' the bits you know all too well aren't the best parts, it's the last third as things rise to a new pitch, Kirk so close to abandoning his starship existence, his will holding him back, the cure as each of them come to their senses, and the tragic inability for Spock to show affection, once again back in his shell to the sadness of Leila, a sadness that is able to cure her of the Spores' influence. Then Spock speaks of us all living in self-made Purgatories, a poetic conclusion.

The episode ends, once again, on a more thoughtful note, with Kirk's discourse on the need for struggle rather than having everything handed to you, though I would argue that paradise doesn't have to mean that, and a true one would have effort and creative output at the heart of its existence, satisfying the need, not a lack of anything meaningful. But I'd agree with Kirk on the idea of avoiding a paradise that doesn't come with the opportunity for improvement and turns people lazy or lets them dissolve into happy feelings as if that was the ultimate goal of existence, like the addiction to drugs or, well, anything. But no wants and no needs? I'm not sure that would be such a bad thing, and neither did the humanity of the 24th Century, though even that was far from perfection. The most inspiring moment comes with Sandoval's decision to stoop and pick up worn out tools, or whatever the Kipling poem says, standing up to return to the dream he and his fellow colonists set out to do. Like Kirk, he's a true leader and isn't going to let a setback stop him for good, despite his dismay at the time that's been lost. They don't hunt down the Spores and destroy them, they just leave the planet that would be uninhabitable without the Spores anyway, due to berthold rays. The saddest thing is that Spock admits to being happy for the first time, but I like that despite this he is resolved to return to the path he has chosen, not changing his mind because of a taste of freedom he hasn't enjoyed before.

If Spock is out of character (Sandoval calling him a Vulcanian even this late in the season!), Dr. McCoy is just as much, if not more, reverting to a Southern country twang. When he gets heated thanks to the Communicators and threatens to 'see how fast I can put you in a hospital' when Sandoval tells him there's no more need for his doctor's skills any more, it's a reminder of the edge McCoy has, and if he ever chose to use his knowledge for ill, everyone had better look out (as we'd see in short order when he goes crazy in 'The City On The Edge of Forever'), Sandoval felled by a single, nasty prod. Maybe that's one reason he was so fearless in the face of Khan's scalpel - he knows every inch of the human body and how to disable it if need be. It's also fun to see DeForest Kelley playing more to his famous Western baddies persona that he was best known for before Trek. A couple of characters return: DeSalle had been in 'The Squire of Gothos' (though I mistook him for Stiles from 'Balance of Terror' and noticed with interest he was so comfortable working with Spock), there as a biologist, apparently, since Kirk specifically asked for McCoy and a biologist, which I at first wondered if Sulu was in that role until DeSalle has a biology report. Mr. Leslie's also back, helping move the colonists' belongings for beam-up. And then he's standing in line to beam down in the mutiny, even speaking to Kirk and refusing to back down, so either there's two of him, or he came up to the ship again! It's a bit like 'The Return of The Archons,' everything peaceful and serene, except for a secret menace to the outward tranquility, a style of episode that would become a Trek staple over the years, and another angle on the false realities that I find so interesting: the side of paradise that proves false.

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