Title: Operation: Annihilate!
Airdate: 4/13/1967
Plot Summary
The Enterprise heads to Deneva where Kirk’s brother is stationed, hoping to prevent mass hysteria that has affected other planets, on a path that Deneva is right in the middle of. They arrive too late, as a creature has taken the populace. Can Kirk find out how to stop this menace, especially since one of them has taken his first officer?
Risk Is Our Business
Kirk is not at his best here. Worrying about his brother and his family, he snaps at Uhura. We do find out that he only has one nephew, not three. Kirk is a bit pissed at Bones for blinding Spock, though he knows it was his decision. He later tells Bones it wasn’t his fault, but Bones is not hearing it.
Logical
Spock gets infected by the flying barf monsters but as a Vulcan, he’s able to deal with it better than humans. This is the third time he will say “It’s not life as we know it.” I guess he said it a lot more than I recalled.
He’s Dead Jim
Bones can’t wait the 3 minutes to get the lab work back on how the creature died before he blinds Spock. That was stupid. To be fair, Bones does feel pretty guilty about it.
Canon Maker
Kirk’s brother Sam has already been established but this is the first time we get to see him. Played by Shatner in a mustache, I guess they couldn’t be bothered to get another actor to play a dead body.
Oh, the Vulcan inner eyelid is introduced here, something that was probably pulled out the writers’ asses.
Canon Breaker
The only canon breaker is that Sam only has one son. Though I guess that was the break back in the episode Kirk mentions he has three nephews.
Man It Feels Bad To Be a Red Shirt
No deaths! Except for Sam and his wife. But no red shirts.
Technobabble
Operation: Annihilate confirms there are fourteen science labs on the Enterprise.
I Know That Guy:
Joan Swift plays Kirk’s sister-in-law with hysterics. But I appreciate her only thought is to get Kirk to stop these things.
Craig Huxley plays Peter, Kirk’s nephew though he doesn’t do much except be in bed and occasionally moan. He would return with an actual part in the execrable And The Children Shall Lead.
What It Means To Be Human – Review
What we have here is a middle-of-the-road episode of Star Trek, made slightly worse in that it was the season finale. I would’ve liked to have seen something a little better close this season out.
In Operation: Annihilate, Kirk’s family has much less impact than it should have. We don’t really get to know Sam, all we see is his dead body on the floor. This is made even more weird by Shatner playing him.
Aurelan has more to do, but mostly just screaming.
The things are not exactly scary. They look like a fake barf flying around. The idea isn’t all bad though, as a sort of invasion of the body snatchers type of story. I also like the idea of realizing that an energy that is not harmful to us might be really bad for something else. In this case, light.
Spock being blinded was a silly addition, especially the whole inner eyelid thing so everything could go back to the status quo. Granted, they can’t blind him for the remainder of the show but it really doesn’t come across as convincing in the slightest.
I do have to give props to Nimoy’s performance though. Spock is in constant pain and he does a good job of showing it, with occasional twitches here and there when he’s speaking to Kirk and Bones.
Bones is fun as well. I liked the idea of him doing something wrong and hurting Spock. He took it really badly and you can see that underneath it all, he has real affection for Spock.
Operation: Annihilate is not a bad episode, and it’s not a great episode, but adequate.
Season 1 Thoughts
Well, that’s the end of Season 1. Look for us to start on Season 2 after the first half of next year, or maybe in December if I get enough of a backlog written up. I’ve enjoyed it and I hope you guys like it too. What do you think? What should I change as I continue with our trek through Trek?
Season 1 really set the template. The highs were very high and there weren’t too many stinkers. Mudd’s Women and The Alternative Factor stand out on the low side, but Balance of Terror and A Taste Of Armageddon are on the high side.
And of course The City On The Edge Of Forever is possibly the best episode across all of Trek.
I like that mostly this season, the idea was, to quote Lord Of The Rings, some things looked foul and felt fair. In other words, things that are different are not necessarily evil. Then there are episodes like Arena where even though bad things happen, Kirk and company take a better path. Inspirational stuff.
It’s a great start to a great franchise. Let’s see how Season 2 stacks up!