The Survivor

DVD, Star Trek: The Animated Series (The Survivor)

An amalgam of 'TOS' ideas, but they pleasingly come together to form something more than the monster story it first seemed as a shape-changing 'Vendorian' is let loose on the Enterprise, a Romulan spy to lure Kirk and crew into the Neutral Zone to give the Romulans the right to confiscate the starship. First thought was that this was 'What Are Little Girls Made Of?' since it's about a great man who went missing and how his fiance deals with it when he's found by the Enterprise. Nurse Chapel was the fiance in that episode, this time it's another crewmember, Anne, who has to learn to overcome her feelings to perform her duty, despite Carter Winston turning out to be an alien in disguise. There are also hints of 'The Man Trap,' since the creature changes depending on who it's dealing with, and even 'The Enterprise Incident' - this is almost an inverse as Kirk was a spy aboard a Romulan ship in that episode, trying to get their technology, and this time they plant a spy and try to get the Enterprise, so it's quite a good story, even featuring the Trek staple of not judging people on appearances as Anne comes to be drawn to this Vendorian who has the memories of her intended, despite its true form being a space octopus!

It has a much happier ending than those other episodes I mentioned as they go off together after 'Winston' has agreed to submit to incarceration and trial, while Kirk will speak for him since he saved the Enterprise by turning himself into a deflector when Scotty didn't have time to fix the defence system, and Anne requests to be his guard to talk with him of his future. I imagine the Vendorian became a piece of equipment rather than being the actual energy field (though we have seen Odo and other Changelings turn into gas or light, so it's possible), since he's already showed himself capable of becoming a 'table' as McCoy refers to the biobed in Sickbay. That was typical of the slight inconsistencies of 'TAS,' and to some extent 'TOS,' when things weren't quite as tied down and definitive as they became in later Trek. I thought there was another mistake when Kirk's on the Bridge and gives Sulu his orders, then M'Ress, though there was no sign of the Caitian and I supposed they'd got her confused with Lieutenant Arex who was on screen when Kirk said that. It could be explained that the Captain was still slightly dazed from being put to sleep by the Vendorian, but later we do see M'Ress for the first time on the series so I assume he was talking to her 'off camera.'

M'Ress was a good design, one of the non-human crewmembers that were possible due to the unlimited potential of animation, and voiced in feline manner by Majel Barrett, who also played Chapel in this episode as well as the computer (I enjoyed that it said "Working" and they used the Tri-screen again!). Barrett wasn't the only person playing multiple roles as Nichelle Nichols can be heard as Anne, perhaps why Uhura, though seen in the Bridge background, doesn't speak in this episode - they may have thought the voice too similar to the Lieutenant's. Nichols also played the voice of Security Kirk speaks to on the comm. Curiously, it sounded as if they got some other voice artists to perform Carter Winston and the Romulan we see commanding the Battlecruiser. Usually James Doohan performs the extra male voices, so maybe they felt they could branch out after getting Stanley Adams back for the previous episode to play his original character, Cyrano Jones? Either that or Doohan is even better at disguising his voice than I thought!

Winston looks very much like a 1970s man, all shaggy hair, thick sideburns and moustache, this rugged space adventurer, or foremost space trader as he's described, is apparently famous for his money, making fortunes in his profession, which shows that money and riches were still part of the Trek world and such things hadn't been ironed out yet. At least he was shown to be a philanthropist in a throwaway line that confirms Dr. McCoy did indeed have a daughter as was originally to have been revealed in 'The Way To Eden,' the space hippies episode from 'TOS' in Season 3. She went to school on Cerebus, McCoy says, and although that specific planet is never mentioned in Trek, Cerebus II is spoken of in 'TNG' ('Too Short A Season'). Just as interesting to me was that the Romulan Commander is dressed in green, which would become the race's signature colour in later Trek, and has hair in a definite 'V' shape over his forehead, again a potential inspiration for how they eventually appeared in 'TNG' onwards. He's sitting in exactly the same chair as Koloth was in the previous episode, and of course we see the Klingon-Romulan treaty must still be in operation as they're using the Klingon Battlecruisers they did since Season 3 of 'TOS.'

Probably for the same reason: that it was cheaper to reuse the design than create new ships. It's a bit easier to show more of the Enterprise that we didn't see before: the Engine Room appears pretty similar, though Sickbay now has a laboratory at one end and McCoy appears to have a separate office, too. Kirk's Quarters seemed bigger with a modern art geometric painting on the wall and a sofa to complement his desk and bed, with the familiar chain-link screen dividing the room, which was nice to see. And though it may seem a little daft for everything on the Bridge to be recorded so they can show Kirk he did give the order to enter the Neutral Zone, it was shown to be the case as far back as 'TOS' Season 1, 'Court Martial,' so it must be standard practice, at least at this time. And it features a title that was reused almost exactly in 'TNG,' though that was called 'The Survivors,' much like 'TNG's 'Brothers' and 'DSC's 'Brother.'

***