In A Piece Of The Action, the Enterprise has been sent to the remote planet Sigma Iotia II. A century before, the planet was visited by a ship from earth- the Horizon- which was lost with all hands shortly after departing from there. The Federation just recently learned of this, due to the fact that Horizon's distress call was sent by conventional radio. Because the Horizon visited Iotia before the advent of the Prime Directive, its crew interacted with the Iotians who were, at the time, in the early stages of industrialization. The Enterprise has been sent to assess the damages caused by this fraternization and so arrives not knowing what to expect.
The Cranford DVDs once again proved elusive on Sunday night so we ended up watching a couple episodes of Star Trek T.O.S. One of these was A Piece Of The Action, which is a light-hearted season two episode. It is one of the times when T.O.S. succeeded at comedy and, while it might not make a top ten list of best episodes, a lot of fans hold it in great affection for its humorous dialogue and general sense of fun. In A Piece Of The Action, the Enterprise has been sent to the remote planet Sigma Iotia II. A century before, the planet was visited by a ship from earth- the Horizon- which was lost with all hands shortly after departing from there. The Federation just recently learned of this, due to the fact that Horizon's distress call was sent by conventional radio. Because the Horizon visited Iotia before the advent of the Prime Directive, its crew interacted with the Iotians who were, at the time, in the early stages of industrialization. The Enterprise has been sent to assess the damages caused by this fraternization and so arrives not knowing what to expect. What they find is a society run completely like a 1920's gangland. The different "territories" are run by bosses who are in conflict with each other, frequently ordering "hits" by their men on rival gangs. Public improvements, etc., are accomplished by paying bribes to the bosses, and everyone talks like a 1920's cliche. After Kirk, Spock, and McCoy are kidnapped by one of the bosses, they find out what happened. The Iotians used the instruments left behind by the Horizon crew to speed up their technological development, and based their culture on a book left behind as well. This book turns out to be a historical text entitled Chicago Mobs Of The Twenties and the Iotians have used it as a kind of Bible, following the behaviours detailed in it; the Iotians refer to it reverently as "The Book" and keep fancily-bound copies prominently displayed. Kirk tries to use logic and reason to convince the bosses to stop the violence and work together to form a healthy, functioning society. Unfortunately, this sounds like heretical nonsense to the Iotians, raised on the precepts of The Book. Kirk eventually decides that the only way to reach them is by dealing with them on their own level, adopting their dress and lingo, and claiming to represent "The Feds". It's all wonderfully silly fun, and the sight of "Spocko" in a fedora and holding a tommy gun alone makes the episode worth watching. The other episode we watched on Sunday Night was The Ultimate Computer, also from season two. This is a much more serious episode and I won't say too much about it now as I plan to do a full review of it at a later date. It deals with the very topical and complex issue of man's role in an increasingly computerized world.
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