Star Trek: The Naked Time

Spock: "We have three days to live over again."
Kirk: "Not those last three days."

This episode is so beloved by fans that later Star Trek series incarnations deliberately recreated it. And there's a good reason why: you learn a lot about someone when you get drunk with them. In this episode, we got drunk with most of the crew, and had a fabulous time. Well, except for the six deaths on the planet, Joe Tormolen's suicide by butter knife, and nearly crashing the Enterprise into Psi 2000.

What did we learn about the crew? Lots of fun stuff. Sulu sees himself as a nineteenth century swashbuckler, and has a rather amazing chest. Kirk is seriously stressed and pressured by his job, and has a thing for Yeoman Rand. (The attraction escapes me.) Nurse Christine is madly in love with Spock, and knows how little chance she has with him. (That attraction doesn't escape me.)

The highlight is Spock's crying jag in Briefing Room 2. Beneath his ultra cool exterior, Spock is concealing an emotional maelstrom. He's sorry he can't love Christine back, sorry he could never tell his mother he loved her, ashamed that he feels friendship for Kirk. Marvelous performance by Leonard Nimoy. There's a reason that Spock was such a huge sex symbol with the geeks in the sixties and seventies.

This was the first time we saw Spock do his famous neck pinch. We also saw Scotty in the "Jeffries Tube" for the first time, and everyone falling out of their seats when the ship broke free of the planet. Practically everyone in the cast took a turn at the helm or at navigation. To top it off, they accidentally discovered time travel. Quite a nice payoff, and terrific set-up for future episodes.

If you're new to Star Trek and you don't like this episode or the next one ("The Enemy Within"), give it up. You're not going to like the rest of the series, either.

Ben says...

Okay repeat after me, in a potential biohazard zone we keep our gloves ON!

That said, this is as much fun as you can have with a biohazard. I loved this episode as a kid and I love it now. It really is drunk people will be drunk people. Some are fun (Sulu), some will find trouble no matter what (Riley), some are morose and brooding (Spock) and some get their freak on (Nurse Chapel), but none should be allowed to pilot a star ship drunk. Riley has perhaps the best line of an episode full of great lines with, "No dance tonight" (been there, buddy). It's atypical of Star Trek with its lack of a deep message or theme (which is part of what made Star Trek good science fiction, if not always great TV). However, this is one of the few first season episodes that features serious character development and it establishes character traits that stay with us throughout the series and beyond. Spock completes his transformation from the character in "The Cage" who was distinguished by yelling and pointy ears to one of the most beloved (and lusted after) characters in sci-fi history. But I think the best development may well have been with Uhura. She establishes herself as someone who could hold her own with the male cast in the one scene with Sulu, and ensures that her future on the show is as something other than an African American Yeoman Rand.

Back to Billie for bits and pieces:

-- Star date 1704.2. The planet was named Psi 2000.

-- Riley (in a lovely performance by guest star Bruce Hyde) serenaded the crew from Engineering. I've always particularly liked how he punched buttons as accompaniment, and blew on doors to open them.

-- We learn that the warp engines are powered by a controlled implosion of matter and antimatter.

-- The environmental suits that Joe so idiotically circumvented were made from repurposed shower curtains. Unfortunately, they looked like they were made from repurposed shower curtains.

-- It was confirmed that Spock's blood is indeed green. (And yet, his lips are pink. They should be chartreuse, shouldn't they?) Spock is also a lot stronger than Kirk; when he hit him, Kirk practically flew across the room. Ouch.

-- The guy who replaced Sulu on the bridge may had had the worst reading of lines in the entire series.

-- Sulu's remarkable chest deserves a second mention. Spock looked good in a form-fitting tank top, too.

-- Christine's hairdo was pretty extreme, especially for a nurse who was on duty. I know they were just trying to be futuristic, but most of the exotic female hairstyles looked like they were about to go trick-or-treating.

-- In case you're new to all this, Christine was played by Majel Barrett, who was married to creator and executive producer Gene Roddenberry. Majel Barrett Roddenberry was in nearly every incarnation of Trek, as Number One in "The Cage", Lwaxana Troi in Next Gen, and the voice of the main computer in nearly everything.

Quotes:

Kirk: "In a critical orbit, there's no time for surprise."
Scotty: "Unless you people on the bridge start taking showers with your clothes on, my engines can pull us out of anything."

Sulu: "What do you mean, what do you do with it?"
Riley: "Self-defense? Mayhem? Shish-ka-bob?"

Christine: "He's dead, Doctor."
It's something of a continuing joke that McCoy says, "He's dead, Jim" in every episode. Let's see if it's true. I'll record it if it's said.

Sulu: "I'll protect you, fair maiden."
Uhura: "Sorry, neither."

Kirk: "I'd like you to teach me that, sometime."
Spock: "Take d'Artagnan here to Sick Bay."

Scotty: "I canna change the laws of physics!"
This is another famous line that is supposedly in every episode. Except it's not.

Four out of four Vulcan neck pinches,

Billie

All of our Star Trek reviews are archived here.
Original air date: September 29, 1966
Season 1, episode 4
Photo credit: Memory Alpha