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| "We meet again, Kirk. Remember me? I'm the comic relief!" — Harry F'n. Mudd |
I, Mudd, The Original Series, Season 2, Episode 8
Much like my review of ‘The Enemy Within,’ I’m really going to attempt to look at this episode through the lens of when it was made, what its intent is, and what they’re trying to say with it. But I’m not sure how successful I'm going to be with that. Because, damn, this episode it completely effing nuts. For the record, that's nuts not in a way that I enjoyed.
Much like the androids who sought to overthrow the galaxy, I just can’t process this episode. I just… I just can’t. It hurts my robot brain. What I find frustrating about that is, the premise of this episode is damned terrifying. The concept of unstoppable, immortal robots who seek to supplement humanity as a step towards galactic conquest is a threat as large as any crew in Star Trek has faced. The cold open involves an android taking control of the Enterprise and delivering the crew to his home planet. He does this having infiltrated the crew, passed as human for weeks, and rigged the ship to blow itself to bits if the crew interfered with its plan. But when the ship arrives as its destination, the crew is beamed down to face hundreds of thousands of the androids.
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| "You. Know. I. Am. Dane. Jer. Us. Be. Hold. My. Ro. Bot. Guts." — Evil Android Norman |
And his space-handlebar mustache.
From there the adventure takes a turn for the absurd as Mudd, the ne'er-do-well space swindler that the crew had faced before. Mudd's a fan-favorite, but I don't get him. The characterization and appearance is over-the-top, scenery-chewing, wtf-is-happening and oddly out of place in the Star Trek universe. All he does for me is heighten the stylized nature of the show. While Mudd's appearance should provide a counterbalance to the dangerous nature of the threat, all it does is work to undermine it. The second Mudd appears on screen, all real danger gets thrown out the window. Kirk goes from concern to amused. The situation degenerates quickly from oh-shit-we're-all-going-to-die to oh-for-the-love-of...
Mudd prances around declaring himself Emperor, and even has a robot version of his cartoonish shrew ex-wife he can boss around, who's played with subtlety worthy of the Flintstones. The robots try to please their new human masters by provideing them with their heart's desires. Scotty gets a workshop. Checkov gets vomen to manhandle. McCoy gets an advanced medical bay. Uhura is tempted by immortal beauty in a way that is not in the slightest way horribly sexist.*
Everyone is given what they want except Kirk, who just wants to boss people around. And denied of that, he decides to ruin everyone else's fun. Kirk is really only happy when Kirk's in charge. I'm kidding, of course. Not even Kirk is that shallow. Shatner maybe, but not Kirk. The Captain sees the android planet for what it is, a prison. A nice prison, and one with very nice toys, but still a prison. Kirk knows he can't take on the androids head-on, so they devise another plan. One that does not compute.
Not in the slightest.
They defeat the machines with silliness. Bonkers, Laugh-in-style nonsense is how they define humanity for the robots in hopes that it'll overload the androids logic circuits. It’s a completely bananas plan. And it goes on forever. Like, way beyond what could be expected for either the androids or the audience to stand. The crew speak contradictions, dance to no music, profess love and hate at the same time and confuse the androids (and me) into submission. Seriously, this could not —not — end fast enough.
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| "You can danze iv you vant to. You can leave your friendz behind!" — Ensign Checkov |
Now's the part of the review where I say something nice about the episode. All I can really think of is that it's over and I never have to watch it again. It's too harsh to say I hated this episode, but, lord, I did not enjoy it.
Yet, this episode is inarguably iconic. So much so that the premise that robots can be defeated by paradoxes and illogic has permeated everything from Futurama** and Portal 2.*** It's now a much-used trope of science fiction. Even if someone has never seen Star Trek, they probably know about this episode. If they don't, they probably know. That. Ro. Bots. Talk. Like. This.†
So, who am I to argue with history?
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Up next, Beverly Crusher is at the center of a mystery in Remember Me.
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*I lied, it is.
** In all fairness, there’s not much in science fiction that Futurama hasn’t hit upon, but the point is, this episode is preposterously famous.
*** Portal 2 a thing that I love, btw.
† But, meh, so does Shatner.
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