September 29th, 1967, "The Changeling"
Obligatory "STTMP is a worse version of this episode" joke, moving on...
Fiver by IJD GAF
Memory Alpha
Transcript
The Episode
SULU: Captain, shields just snapped on. Something heading in at multiwarp speeds.
Multiwarp? Is that anything like transwarp?
KIRK: Five hundred kilos and only one metre long?
SCOTT: What kind of intelligent creatures can exist in a thing that small?
SPOCK: Intelligence does not necessarily require bulk, Mister Scott.
I suddenly wonder how much a Hooloovoo weighs (kudos to those who get the reference).
KIRK: Besides, once it's aboard, it won't be taking any more shots at us.
Why not? If anything, weapons fire from the inside out could do more damage because the hull will contain at least some of the energy.
MCCOY: I thought you might like to know that Lieutenant Uhura is back to college level. She'll be back on the job within a week.
This reeducation in a week stuff is just ridiculous. Even if we're to buy that the raw information can be imprinted onto the brain, there's more to being a person, much less a Starfleet officer, than raw information. What about her childhood, what about her hobbies, the relationships she's formed? At least run her through the transporter using the most recent trace to restore her mind to what it was a few days ago!
The Fiver
Spock: I'm not reading any lifeforms in the entire system. It appears that one of our planets is missing.
No Animated Series joke, IJD?
Kirk: I am Captain James T. Kirk of the
U.S.S. Enterprise. But you can call me T-Bone. By the way, I'm single.
T-Bone?
Kirk: I've been hitting on tiny space chicks?
McCoy: Looks like a robot to me.
Scotty: I'll say. It just leaked oil on the transporter pad.
Nomad: I require star charts.
Spock: Jim, that book isn't canon. If we show it to him, the data may be contradicted in future episodes!
Kirk: It's a risk we'll have to take.
Book? I think we might need a dicer for this one.
Spock: I also believe it is confusing the captain with its creator, Roykirk.
McCoy: Or maybe Kirk Douglass.
Kirk: Or Ole Kirk Christiansen, inventor of the LEGO.
McCoy: Or Southern Gospel talent Kirk Talley.
Kirk: Or Congressman Mark Steven Kirk, 10th District Illinois.
Kirk Douglas only has one "s". Anyway, he starred in many films, and he's still kicking at the ripe old age of 100. I shudder to think that in time he'll be remembered for
20,000 Leagues Under The Sea and nothing else.
Ole Kirk Christiansen, the LEGO guy. He made my youth so much richer, and the day I had to surrender my collection to a younger generation was a sad day indeed (of course I still have a few souvenirs). I may have mentioned before how I was a member of the fan club for many years.
Mark Steven Kirk retired recently from Congress. "Kirk" means "church" in Scotland. Apparently Star Trek invented "roykirk" as a name, but there was a guy in Minnesota named Monte Roy Kirk who died in 2002, so let him have his five seconds of fame. Other James Kirks in history include a
Scottish actor, a
Union Army officer from the Civil War (his middle initial is even "T", although for Thompson and not Tiberius), an
English WWI soldier and Victoria Cross recipient,
the captain of the Navy Destroyer USS Zumwalt (jokes were made when he got the job),
a member of the defunt Scottish punk band Orange Juice, a
former Scottish soccer player, and a
former Canadian Parliment member.
Spock: (ahem) Between Nomad's launch and our encounter, it collided with an alien probe programmed to sterilize soil samples. Though I have no idea how that explains its ridiculously god-like powers.
Kirk: Perhaps the data was referring to the advanced soil-sample peoples of--
Is that last line a reference to something?
Memory Alpha
* Comparisons between this and STTMP abound. Some add the subtitle "Where Nomad Has Gone Before" to the movie.
* Then again, this episode stole from an episode of
The Outer Limits first. Everyone join the plagiarism conga line!
* Somehow the equivalent of 90 photon torpedoes only dropped shield strength by 20%. This is an obvious mistake on the scriptwriters part, I'd think the equivalent of ten would do the job just as well.
* One of four "Kirk talks a computer to death" episodes.
* Nichols argued that Uhura would remember Swahili first, not English. Why would this matter? Her mind is supposedly completely blank, she would have no memory or preference for any language! Besides, these guys are speaking Federation Standard and not English, right?
YouTube
Note: Google-fu is hard to use with this episode as "changeling" generates a lot more DS9 links than anything related to this episode.
*
Kirk talks Nomad to death.
*
Fans have built a functioning Nomad prop.
Nitpicker's Guide
* Phil wonders why the crew can't lure Nomad back to the transporter and beam him out only as energy.
* How would a soil-sterilizing probe have planet-destroying capability anyway?