Title: How Sharper The Serpent’s Tooth
Airdate: 10/5/1974
Plot Summary
In How Sharper The Serpent’s Tooth, the Enterprise is tracing the course of a probe that scanned Earth and sent a signal back along its course. They are attacked by a serpent-shaped energy field belonging to a feathered serpent who claims to be Kulkukan of Mayan-Aztec legend. It beams Kirk, McCoy, Scott, and Ensign Walking Bear aboard its ship to solve its puzzle before it reveals itself. Aligning the mirrors in a strange city, they solve the puzzle, and Kulkukan appears before them.
It takes them to its “zoo” of violent creatures that now live in tranquility. Spock figures a way to break Kulkukan’s force field, and Kirk uses the diversion to free the animals. Kulkukan realizes that it is not a god, but just a delusional old alien that once helped the younger races along. It leaves in sadness, leaving McCoy to remember the Shakespearean quote, “How sharper than a serpent’s tooth is an ungrateful child…”
Risk Is Our Business
Kirk tries to reason with Kulkukan, but it doesn’t go well. He also tranqs the electric lion (I’m not going to try to spell whatever they called it) and takes a nasty shock in the process.
Logical
Spock figures out Kulkukan’s force field weakness and is able to break the Enterprise free. It gets thrown about 5 light-years away doing it, but they get back pretty quick.
He’s Dead, Jim
McCoy is able to identify the electric lion and suggests they free it to create havoc and distract Kulkukan.
Helm Sluggish Captain
Sulu is absent. He’s replaced by Ensign Walking Bear. He’s a red shirt in the helm but is really there to identify Kulkukan, being Comanche. He’s studied a lot of ancient native American religions, even the Mayans and Aztecs. And he doesn’t die. But he shouldn’t have been at the helm with a red shirt. Maybe he was interning.
Hailing Frequencies Open, Sugar
Uhura asks Spock if they shouldn’t be trying to find the captain, and Spock reminds her to keep scanning the frequencies, as they must free the Enterprise first and find any possible weaknesses they can. She’s not pleased at being dressed down but wisely keeps her mouth shut.
My Wee Bairns
Scotty gets whisked to the spaceship and has to play a puzzle by moving the snake heads to point at the pyramid.
Three Arms Are Better Than Two, Ya Fuzzy Face
Arex works the tractor beam and warp power to get them out of the bubble.
Getting Animated
Kukukan is apparently another god who visited us long ago. Wonder if he ran into the Olympians or not? Maybe he took the west, and they took the east?
Technobabble
Elastic force fields don’t work if you push it in both directions. Tractor it and push the hull against it, and it goes pop.
What It Means To Be Human – Review
So we start out this episode with someone at Sulu’s place names Walking Bear. Gee, I wonder if he’s going to have some role to play in this episode? Then we get a ship with a snake god on it named Kulkukan from an ancient Mayan Myth, as well as Chinese dragon gods. It’s Who Mourns For Adonis all over again.
Kirk, for his part, is a little nicer about it than he was then. But really, it plays out nearly the same, except the snake god doesn’t try to get himself a nice, pretty crew lady to try to have sex with.
Quite frankly it’s tiresome. Humans haven’t changed; they are all warlike, blah blah blah. We even have Spock yelling at Uhura again. The beats are nearly identical. It just doesn’t have nearly the same impact as the Apollo episode, and that one wasn’t exactly setting the world on fire in the first place.
All in all, a completely forgettable episode.
