Sunday, January 16, 2011

#47 (2-13): Obsession

Kirk gets into a really foul mood while suffering from the mother of all bad gas attacks.


THE PLOT

The Enteprise is on another of those conveniently uninhabited Class M planets, where they have discovered tritanium.  This is a rare mineral that will never figure into the plot of this episode or even be mentioned by the episode ever again, so don't worry about it. Kirk is about to beam back to the ship, so that Enterprise can deliver some of that extra-special Space Vaccine they so often have to transport to relieve the suffering of yet another colony world suffering from an outbreak of that Space Plague that seems to be virulent within the Federation of Planets. Then he smells a honey-like scent, and dispatches the security team to investigate.

A couple of minutes later, the security team is attacked by a giant gas cloud. Two men are killed, and Security Officer Rizzo is badly injured.  He dies in sickbay shortly after gasping a bit of exposition at Kirk. Convinced that this gas cloud is the same gas cloud that attacked him when he was a young ensign aboard the Farragut, Kirk insists on staying in orbit until he can destroy the creature. As Kirk's behavior becomes ever more angry and stubborn, Spock and McCoy begin to question Kirk's fitness for command.

Then the creature leaves the planet, sparking a high-speed chase through the galaxy. A chase that ends when the creature abruptly turns and enters the Enterprise itself!


CHARACTERS

Capt. Ham: William Shatner is in pure, theatrical ham mode throughout. That's not a bad thing. There's "good ham" and "bad ham," and Shatner is delivering Grade A, USDA Choice Swine throughout. Take the pause he gives in the teaser: "Something that cannot possibly exist. (pause) But does." He milks that pause for all it's worth, until it goes from merely pregnant to on the verge of delivering a litter of kittens.

The script invites - nay, begs - Shatner to really indulge, and he does. Kirk is snappish and emotional, accusing his officers of "conspiring" against them. Then, immediately after apologizing for the use of the word "conspire," he begins berating Chekov to run a scan "TWENTY times if NECESSARY!" Both Shatner and script do everything they can to make Kirk appear as irrational as possible. But the episode gets points for allowing Kirk to make a strong case, when finally confronted by McCoy and Spock, even before the creature proves its intelligence.

Mr. Spock: Grows concerned observing Kirk's increasingly irrational behavior. He asks McCoy for advice, because he still isn't so familiar with the human expression of emotion as to be sure where the line is between simply being emotional and being unfit. When Kirk provides his explanation of his actions, Spock accepts Kirk's claim of intuition as a command prerogative; and when even McCoy is still blaming Kirk for his dangerous "monster hunt," Spock accepts that the creature has shown a malevolent intelligence and is on Kirk's side again from that point on. He does get the most apt line of the episode, when he observes to Garrovick that the last thing the current situation calls for is even more human emotion.

Dr. McCoy: Another excellent showing by DeForest Kelley. He lets McCoy's doubts over Kirk's stability in this situation show without compromising the character's essential frienship with and support for his captain. After Spock expresses his concern to McCoy, he gets a very good scene in which he goes to talk to Kirk. He's probably there alone to try to feel Kirk out. Had Kirk reacted less aggressively, he may have told Spock not to worry at this time. But when Kirk responds by lashing out at him, accusing him of overstepping, McCoy calls Spock in and raises what had been an informal talk into something official. It's an excellent scene, well-played by all three regulars.


ZAP THE REDSHIRT!

Redshirt Count: Five, maybe six. Leslie and another redshirt sacrifice themselves for the sake of the dramatic teaser. Fear not, Leslie fans - Death will not stop him from returning in future episodes! Meanwhile, Rizzo, another security man, lives long enough to deliver up some exposition before also giving up the ghost. Garrovick's two security men get to be the cannon fodder for the next commercial fadeout. One survives the attack, though we never do find out whether he recovers. A sixth crewman dies offscreen when the cloud attacks the ship, meaning that this episode either ties or beats out The Apple for highest number of redshirt deaths to date.


THOUGHTS

OK, I'm probably stepping into a minefield. I'm aware that Obsession is a "fan favorite" episode. It is entertaining and well-played by its three leads. But on this viewing, as on previous viewings, I found myself unable to fully get past certain issues. It's not a bad episode. But there are problems here that keep it from being the great episode it might have been.

Some of the problems are down to uninspired directing. Ralph Senensky's directing is of the "point-and-shoot" variety. That's adequate for episodes like Bread and Circuses and This Side of Paradise, both of which were carried by character dialogue. In a more action-heavy episode such as this one, a bit more is demanded of the director. Senensky fails to take advantage of the tools at his disposal to raise tension. Everything is flatly lit, often overlit.

Some more creative use of cameras and lighting might have really made the middle portion of the episode. As it stands, there is no real difference in atmosphere between the part of the episode in which the creature is on the ship and the early part of the show, when McCoy and Spock are not even convinced that the cloud is anything other than a natural phenomenon.

The show is not helped by a very bland guest performance by Stephen Brooks, in a major guest role as Garrovick. Brooks is pretty dull throughout, with his "guilt-stricken" acting not particularly differing from his "relieved" acting once he learns that his hesitation was not to blame for his men's deaths. A better actor would have turned this guest character, who gets a LOT more screentime than most "guest crewman" post-Season One have managed, into someone more convincing and sympathetic. As it is, he's really just there to be a plot piece and someone for Kirk to overly identify with.
The script is structurally very sound for 40 of its 50 minutes. The first twenty minutes convincingly makes Kirk appear irrational without having him actually stop being the Kirk we've been watching. When Spock and McCoy make their official inquiry, Kirk has answers for them - good ones. This may be Kirk's "Captain Ahab" episode... but in this case, the white wale is a legitimate threat, and Kirk's actions wouldn't be in any question if not for the Plot Devices, er vaccines that need delivered to Planet Whogivesadamn. Enough backstory is laid in to make Kirk's connection with the creature believable, without overexplaining it to a point where it would belabor the point.

Unfortunately, that structure runs into an entirely unnecessary problem at the climax. In an attempt to raise the stakes for the final confrontation, Spock tells us "evidence indicates that the creature is here to spawn." OK, fair enough, but... What evidence? They spend 20+ minutes establishing that the creature is intelligent and does pose a risk, another 20 minutes chasing the creature and then expelling it from the ship.  At what point is any evidence gathered related to the creature spawning? Are we to take it that all of Shatner's dramatic pauses got the creature pregnant? As desirable as it is to raise the stakes for the final showdown, crowbarring something in that the episode simply hasn't established takes away from the drama rather than enhancing it.

I don't want to come across like I'm trashing Obsession. It is a fun episode. But it's also one whose reputation might be just a little overinflated.


Rating: 6/10.

Previous Episode: The Gamesters of Triskelion
Next Episode: The Immunity Syndrome

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