Star Trek The Original Series "A Taste of Armageddon" episode review

Before I do this review proper, I just want to add I've always loved the Star Trek episodes where diplomacy of some sort was the focus of the protagonist cast, because usually the Federation's ambassadors were usually competent but nigh always had ego problems, were idealistic to the point they were convinced they could get anyone to join hands and sing Kumbayaa with them, and their arrogance usually caused most of the issues in the episode.

This is going to be one of those episodes.



We begin as Kirk narrates a captain log about how they are enroute to Eminar VII to open diplomatic relations with the people there. Just as Uhura and Kirk discuss whether anyone is picking up the phone in response to their hails, Ambassador Robert Fox walks onto the bridge, just as Uhura confirms they got the message, and sent back a "Code 710"

Fox is all "Uh, what's that?" and is duly informed that is shorthand for "Go away and stay away."

Fox tells Kirk that is to be disregarded, and Kirk is all "Uh, they have every right to tell us to go away if they want, it's their planet."

Fox counters a lot of lives have been lost in that sector of space over 20 years, and the Federation hopes to establish a porting station on Eminar VII to put an end to it. Kirk sensibly points out they could get MORE people killed and get dragged into a war if they disregard Code 710, and Fox is all

"I'll take that risk."


Now, before we go on, this episode gives the lie to Kirk's reputation of treating the Prime Directive like toilet paper. He got an unambiguous message from a planet to please leave them alone, and instead of defying it, he intended to submit to their wishes and leave.

Of course, we won't have an episode if things go that smoothly, but here's proof Kirk is not as stupid and crazy as some of his detractors in and out of universe would attest. It's worth noting the Prime Directive is never named in this episode, but a lot of the episode hinges on it's concepts.



In fact, Kirk points out he has a ship and crew Fox is demanding he put in danger (for no sensible cause), but Fox is ordering Kirk to do so on his authority given him by the Federation, which gives Fox the power to force Kirk to jump if Fox tells him to.


As Fox storms off the bridge, Kirk and the crew have a "WTF?" look.


Once he leaves, Spock advise Kirk (in less crude language than mine) tell Fox to shove it, but Kirk realizes Fox has him over a barrel and informs the crew they are going to Yellow Alert, and throws in a bit of shade about how he hopes this can be a peaceful mission while stilling ordering phasers and deflectors warmed up as we cut away to the opening credits.


As we resume, the title displays as the Enterprise is in standard orbit around the planet.

Spock is given Kirk the background on what they know, and it goes like this: Eminar VII has been known to be warp capable and has had contact with other civilizations before, but has proven very xenophobic. Last time the Federation checked up on them was fifty years ago. They were at war with a neighboring planet. Also, the Federation away team from the ship USS Valiant sent in to check on them never turned up.

As Fox walks onto the bridge, Kirk says he's going down with a security detail to scope things out. Fox naively is all "why?", and Kirk makes him shut up with a very sensible "we don't know if they'll shoot us, and to make your mission succeed, I must keep you alive, so I'm checking things in advance". Spock then informs Kirk they were scanned by the planet, but otherwise have been ignored, which is strange.

They plan to beam down to a nearby population center that appears peaceful enough so they can say hello, Before leaving with Spock and the security team for the transporters, Kirk leaves Scotty in command.


Before we continue, some naval trivia. Scotty, as chief engineer, would be one of the highest ranking officers in line to succeed the captain in the event of his death or inability to serve.


As we cut to the planet, their security people are briefed the Enterprise crew are going to show up nearby and told to regard the away team correctly, nothing more. As they and the away team meet, the requisite attractive alien chick "Mea 3" (of their Division of Control, their main governing body) and the planet security politely acknowledge the away team and ask they follow them.

Once escorted inside, Mea asks why Kirk showed up, and the exchange goes like this:

Mea: We gave you a clear "go away". Why did you not heed it?
Kirk: I had orders to make an ass of myself unfortunately.
Mea: Well, that was stupid.You're in danger here.
Kirk: Uh, from what?
Mea: I'll let our High Council explain further.

When led to meet them, Kirk learns just how bad that is. He is given a chance to speak before their leaders, politely giving his "we'd like to establish diplomatic relations" pitch, and then learns he just put his neck under a blade.

Note: They refer to the Federation by it's full name for the first time in this episode)

In fact, their spokesman, Anan 7, he reveals they are still at war. Spock is all "you guys have a really nice looking and undamaged planet for a war". Anan is all "we still have 1 to 3 million dead every year".He elaborates and says their third planet, Vendikar, a former colony turned rival, are the foe. The Enterprise is now a target as a result.

We then cut to a panel opening behind them where some shock tubes and mainframe style computers meant to look futuristic (for the 1960s) are shown, and Anan explains they are under attack.


After a few moments, Spock puts the pieces together when he sees what looks like a war game sim being treated with deadly seriousness. The attacks are all simulated on computer between the two planets via computers, and the dead are decided based on what the computer say were those who should have died if said attacks had been quite real.

Essentially, war as a literal videogame, except the dead people are IRL.

Kirk is aghast, and the logic for this whole war becomes clear: Neither side really wants to kill each other in IRL combat, but they can't resolve their differences, so their wars are fought as theoretical combat via computers. Based on what the computers say, the people who should have died if the attack had been real report to "disintegration chambers" so their deaths will follow the computer laid out aftermath, and it's by perpetuating this cycle both planets have fought for 500 years and not ended as cultures. Spock sees the logic in this, and Anan takes this as approval, but Spock corrects him, saying he merely understands, but NOT approves.

Needless to say, Kirk is trying not to lose his shit (and who could blame him?) as he told this batshit premise for a war is considered so normal the people who are supposed to die meekly submit to their own suicides after these "attacks, and that's when Anan 7 drops an even bigger bombshell:

The Enterprise and its crew are now considered part of the "war", destroyed in theory by a tricobalt satellite explosion, and that means the lives of everyone from Kirk on down are considered signed up to die in the disintegration chambers.

And as the Eminar security show up to force Kirk and party to submit to house arrest until the Enterprise crew accept their fate (and they 24 hours to do so), it's made pretty clear this is NOT up for debate in Anan 7's eyes.

As we cut back from the intermission, Kirk and his away team are chilling in their house arrest when Mea 3 comes in and asks if they need anything. Kirk makes the obvious response, and we get this conversation:


Kirk: Do your people really not see how insane it is to walk into a death chamber to kill yourself over a simulated war?
Mea: I've been declared a casualty of that latest attack. By noon tomorrow, I'm to report to one of those chambers.
Kirk: What the-
Mea: Don't think I don't want to live like anyone else, but if I don't, then REAL attacks with REAL weapons happen. This is the better of the choices I have.


Kirk still calls bullshit on this and wants to speak to her boss, but she she leaves the room and one of the Eminar VII security guys makes sure they can't just escape as she leaves by removing the doorknob mechanism.


We cut over to Enterprise bridge, where McCoy is telling Scotty they should have heard something by now,and Scotty asks McCoy what he suggests, prompting a "I'm a doctor, not an officer of the line...."


Before we go on, McCoy both is being sarcastic and being serious. He was at "line officer" rank (Lieutenant or higher) at the time, but as the Chief Medical Officer, his place in the command structure would not have made him the first in line to make command decisions unless all other senior officers on that list were unable to do so.


Scotty continues to press McCoy on what he wants him to do, like opening fire, and that's when Uhura reports Kirk is coming in.

Kirk's message is basically a weird, super positive report that things are going great, the Eminar VII government agreed to full diplomatic relations, and it gets weird as hell with the addition that they are all invited for "shore leave".


Another pause. Even without the audience knowledge this is horseshit, this smells to the Enterprise crew like a sewer for two reasons. One, that's a DRASTIC 180 from the "go away and stay away" message they initially got, and two, even if the offer was genuine, Kirk would not, under regulations, be able to leave his ship completely unmanned for "shore leave", since no naval force in any navy, even in fiction, is to allow naval vessels to be left utterly abandoned while on duty.


The bullshit stinks to the point of being overpowering when we cut back to Anan 7 faking Kirk's voice through his communicator and saying something Kirk would never say about how they'll leave the ship in the hands of trained Eminar VII's people.

Needless to say, the rank smell of utter horseshit over something Kirk would be declared a traitor for authorizing had it really been Kirk spikes Scotty's bullshit sensors into the dark crimson.


It doesn't take long before the computer filters the message through a voice analyzer and comes back with "some jackass is faking Kirk's voice", meaning the Enterprise would be fools to fall for this shit.


We cut back to the planet as Spock and Kirk are discussing using Spock's telepathic skills, and curiously, Spock refers to his people by the term "Vulcanians", not just "Vulcans", though the latter would become the default term. As for the plan, Spock plans to use his touch telepathy to get them out of their prison.

Kirk okays the plan, and Spock plants his fingers on the wall where a guard is leaning on the other side,and it's obvious he's planting a suggestion to make the guard paranoid the prisoners escaped. The guard falls for it, puts the knob back on the door to check (which had been removed to turn the room into a cell), and Kirk judo chops him unconscious.

They prepare to find their communicators and get in touch with the ship, but before they set out, Kirk tells Spock they will need to find more weapons, and they may be forced to kill to secure their escape, to which Spock nods in logical assent to the situation. We then get some Metal Gear Solid style scenes of Kirk and crew hugging walls until guards pass as they try to sneak their way to their goals without getting caught.

As they do this, they come across the disintegration chambers, where they watch in horror as people frog march themselves into a sterile, transporter like booth that literally disintegrates them. They bump into Mea 3 about to take her turn in the chamber, but Kirk is all "Like hell you're committing suicide" as he has Spock head forward tot take out the guard manning the machine.

How he does it is hilarious.

Spock: (strolls up to guard) Excuse me, but there is a multi-legged creature crawling on your shoulder.
Guard: (leans to check)
Spock: (Vulcan neck pinches him unconscious)

Whole scene plays out like some absurd comedy sketch in how causal it comes off.

After Spock relieves the now unconscious guard of his weapon and saunters back to Kirk in full view of some stunned citizens, Kirk (to Mea 3's horror) points his stolen weapon at the machine and destroys it (after telling the people to clear out).

Mea 3: You can't do this!
Kirk: I just did. We're leaving.

As Kirk, her, and everyone else go on their merry way, we cut back to the Eminar council room where Anan 7 gets the heads up the prisoners escaped and a death room got torched. This prompts Anan 7 to order the re-capture of the prisoners, dead or alive, and he also tells the planet's military to stand ready to take out the Enterprise. Once he gets word they are charged and ready, he says to fire in 10 seconds on the authority of the council.



As we cut back from another intermission, Scotty is giving a log, and as he finishes, that's when he gets word the ship is getting raked with disruptor fire. Oddly, he mentions they can't fire full phasers while deflector shields are up, which is odd, since that's not exactly how phasers work, this was obviously a line written before the writers had standardized the logic behind the relationship between phasers and shield tech.

As he idly mentions he could treat them to a few dozen photon torpedos (which somehow work through energy deflectors while phasers won't), Fox enters the bridge and shits his pants at the mere suggestion. In fact, he goes full stupendous ass insisting they are gonna make the mission to establish diplomatic relations succeed, despite Scotty practically screaming in his face:

"THEY'RE SHOOTING AT US AND HAVE OUR CAPTAIN HOSTAGE!"

Fox is hellbent on trying to establish contact, and since Fox can't fuck up anything too badly by simply talking, Scotty okays Uhura to open a channel for him.

We cut back to where Kirk and crew ingeniously returned to where they were imprisoned, figuring it would be the last place anyone would think to look for them, and as Kirk has Spock work on altering a communicator they gypped from a guard to reach the Enterprise, he tries to get Mea 3 to cooperate with him.

She's recalcitrant, but Kirk hits her with the fact that, sure, she can go off herself if she likes, but the killing will just go on and on and on. Their war will never end, the dead will continue to pile up, and basically tells her "are you really satisfied with an eternal war where the bodies never stop piling up?"

As he's managing to talk her into it, we cut over to Anan 7 and his peeps peeing themselves in fear because of the following:

1. Enterprise is still there.
2. They lost a disintegration chamber.
3. Prisoners still AWOL.
4. Their death quota has yet to be met and they fear shit will hit the fan if Vendikar hears of this.

They get wind of Fox's hail, and Anan 7 attempts again to bullshit his way out of what sees to be a crisis.

We cut to the Enterprise where Anan 7's BS is being swallowed by Fox, who is very gullibly taking bait so obvious the hook is not hidden in the least, while Scotty has this "you are one dumb SOB" look on his face Fox is oblivious to, even though the Eminar disruptors seem to have stopped in good faith. At any rate, Anan 7 is wanting the ambassador to beam down to clear everything up, and tells his guys away from the hail to open fire the second the Enterprise drops their shields.

As the call finishes, Fox tells Scotty to drop the shields and assume good faith, and Scotty shows his balls need a forklift to carry them as he tells Fox:

"No. I will not."

In fact, their conversation goes like this

Fox: Wat?
Scotty: Until the captain says to lower the screen, I'm not dropping them.
Fox: I'm pulling rank, lower the screens.
Scotty: I know about your authority, BUT THE SCREENS STAY UP!

McCoy they points out all the duplicitous BS the Eminar VII guys have pulled and tells him to quit being a naive jackass, and Scotty reiterates Fox can take his authority and shove it up his ass, THE SCREENS STAY UP.

Fox tries to threaten Scotty with imprisonment and disgrace, but Scotty does not give the tiniest damn about that. As Fox storms off the bridge, McCoy tells Scotty he just flipped a major table, but Scotty is all "yeah, the haggis is in the fire, but until I know what happened to the captain, I'm not going to drop my shields.

We cut back to the planet, where Anan 7 is about to get himself a drink cause he's had a stressful day, but that's when Kirk appears behind him. Anan 7 is perceptive enough to notice and offers Kirk a drink. Kirk turns him down and also confirms he was the one who fired the disintegration chamber, to which Anan is pretty pissed. In fact, he tries to hit Kirk with this damning indictment on his people and humanity (quote taken from the Memory Alpha Wiki and cited below)

"A killer first, a builder second. A hunter, a warrior. And let's be honest, a murderer. That is our joint heritage, is it not?"

- Anan 7, to Kirk

Granted, he's a got a pretty valid point here, that's a sad but accurate take on humanity. Hell, if you believe the Bible, before we built anything, man committed the first murder when Abel was slain by Cain.

Kirk shakes this off, points his disruptor at Anan, and say he wants to contact his ship. Anan is evasive and says that's small potatoes compared to a world.

Cue Kirk pinning the guy to the wall and telling him if he wants to live, period, he'd better start cooperating. Anan pretends to agree and offers that drink again, hitting a hidden alarm switch as he reaches for his drink. Meanwhile, Kirk calls Anan on the bullshit of using computers to fight a simulated war and forcing people to commit suicide based on the results. He then drops his own bombshell on Anan, and it goes like this:

Kirk: You do realize I could destroy this whole planet by myself

Anan: Why do you think I'm not giving you access to your ship.

Kirk: I don't need it. I'm going to do it.

Anan: With what? That disruptor in your hand?

Kirk: Bingo.

Kirk convinces Anan he's playing hardball, so Anan turns to go fetch the communicators. As they leave, Anan had an ambush security team try to take Kirk down, and while Kirk does a pretty good job, they manage to overpower him after some hokey karate.

After Anan shit talks the groggy Kirk over how he prefers to go down fighting, he has the security guys drag Kirk to the council chamber as we cut for intermission.

As we return, Fox and his aide have beamed down to the planet, in apparent defiance of Scotty, and Fox is holding his diplomatic instructions, still convinced he can talk this out as they  meet Anan 7, having no idea they just walked into a bear trap as they do the basic initial pleasantries. However, Fox finally gets a clue as they walk Fox near the same suicide boxes meant for Kirk's crew and drops the bombshell he's been added to list of people to die.

Fox is 0_0 as it sinks in "yeah, that is not a joke, they aren't gonna kill you".

As Fox is led off, we cut to Spock having finally managed to rig up the communicator to reach the Enterprise (and two away team members are now in disguise as well).Spock warns Scotty anyone who comes down to the planet is doomed, and Scotty curses because Fox went down recently like an idiot.Spock tells Scotty (in the place of Kirk, which can do as first officer if Kirk is not available) to move out of maximum phaser range and stand by.

He then says he's going to find Kirk, but tells Lieutenant Tamara to make sure Mea 3 does not kill herself, even knocking her cross-eyed and sitting on her if she needs to to prevent it.

As he leaves, we cut back over to Fox being hauled to his doom, but just before they can shove Fox in to die (and he's flabbergasted they'd kill an ambassador like this), Spock and his disguised crew show up and disarm the guys about to kill Fox, then tell everyone to back away from the chamber, and brief aside before we go on.

Leonard Nimoy noted in his book "I Am Spock" he had to discipline his voice to fit the role of a thoughtful and logical person. In the original pilot and some early episodes, one can notice Nimoy's classic "Spock" voice is a lot more commanding and even emotional, as Nimoy admitted early on he was still working on it. He briefly drops the Spock voice during this scene where he orders everyone to back away from the chamber he's about to destroy, but this was deliberate to highlight the emotional tension of the scene.

As he fries the suicide box, Spock makes it clear to Fox normal diplomacy is just not going to work, and Fox has a reality check as he confirms Kirk is under heavy guard in the council room, and adds while he's not a soldier, he can learn very quickly, as even he's realizing this is not a time when ordinary diplomacy is going to solve anything.

We then cut away to Anan giving Kirk a guilt trip by saying they have an agreement with Vendikar to  kill X amount of people every time they have an attack, and the Enterprise crew must take part, or they will have a real war.

Anan really pours on the guilt trip about how they will have all the horrors of an actual war if they don't comply with their simulated war terms, and Kirk strikes a nerve when he notes Anan is petrified over that alternative. Kirk casually twists Ana's tail when he comments Anan called him a barbarian and Kirk has on his trollface as he's all "what, you expected otherwise/"

Note he's doing this while sitting in chair in the center of a room where everyone is giving him looks that could kill.

Anan opens a channel to the Enterprise to deliver an ultimatum, and Kirk manages to order Scotty to initiate General Order 24 in two hours before they take him away from the microphone. Anan threatens the Enterprise with the deaths of all their hostages unless they all beam over en masse in 30 minutes.

And then we get this badass exchange:

Anan: (to Kirk) I wasn't kidding.

Kirk: I believe you. I just won't be around when you die an even worse way than me.

Anan: Wat?

Kirk: I gave General Order 24. In two hours, that means the Enterprise turns your planet into a parking lot.

Anan freaks out and tries to order the Enterprise shot down, but Spock's earlier order has kept them out of the fire zone.

And then the badass hardball continues:

Anan: (to Kirk) You wouldn't do this?! The deaths this will cause-

Kirk: (to Anan) I didn't start this, but I will be liable to finish it.

We briefly cut away to Spock's team making their way through the security forces, then we cut back to Anan getting a message Vendikar is getting pissed Eminar's death quota is not being met. Anan tries to guilt Kirk with this, but as Anan gets the news another suicide box got blown up by Spock's team, Kirk makes Anan sweat by saying he doesn't care what box this puts Anan in, he's happy to watch this get worse.

We cut over to Enterprise, where Scotty has Uhura open a channel. He then confirms Kirk was not bluffing, the Enterprise has already primed their fire control system to kill everything important with people, and we cut back to Anan about go batshit because he's now under TWO sources of potential death.

Kirk takes temporary advantage of Anan's little breakdown to overpower some guards and dual wields some disruptors as he tell them he'll talk once they line up nicely, and Spock's team shows up behind them to flip things around to Kirk's advantage.

Spock drily notes he thought Kirk needed help, but it looks like Kirk was fine. Kirk snarks back he still needs some help, and has Spock enter the war sim room. Meanwhile, he contacts Scotty, tells him to stand by for beam out in ten minutes, then adds if they don't hear anything in ten minutes, then General Order 24 is to resume.

As he ends the call, he turns Anan's guilt trip back on Anan. He admits the real horrors of war are something any sane person should avoid, but Anan and his people took an even more craven way out. They removed themselves from all the consequences of war save killing themselves in mass droves that would've happened had the war been real, and in doing so, they perpetuated an endless war that resulted in people killing themselves for nothing because they were too scared to avert the horrors of a real war while not being to stop fighting, so Kirk plans to end the war for them.

He then asks Fox to escort the Eminar VII people out and hold them there, and Fox complies. He does retain Anan's chief aide and has away team member Osborn as an assistant to keep an eye him.

They then enter the war sim area that Spock has been looking at, and as the aide is forced to hand back their weapons and communicators, Spock explains the Eminar war game computer is is constant contact with the Vendikar counterparts, and as a lightbulb clicks in the aide's head, Kirk's intentions are crystal clear, whereupon Osborn shoves the guy out of the room too.

Kirk cooks off the main circuit of the system, and then he and everyone else heads out where Fox is to duck for cover as we get a lot of smoke and fire with the war game mainframe going nova.

As the smoke dies down, Anan and Kirk have this conversation:

Anan: DO YOU REALIZE WHAT YOU'VE DONE?!

Kirk: I do. I gave you back the real horror of real war.

As Anan is in shock, Kirk decides to bitch slap the man with a verbal reality check:

Kirk: Sure, this means you and Vendikar might want to consider killing each other for real.....or you could consider an alternative. End it. Make peace

Anan: How?! We're a killer species, we admit it to ourselves. You're the same!

Kirk: True. But the instinct can be fought. We (referring to humans) admit we're killers too, but we can also say "we are NOT going to kill today".

As Anan is having this thought rattle around his head, Kirk hits the clincher:

Kirk: Contact Vendikar. I'm quite sure you will find they are just as terrified of a real war as you, and despite your urges to kill, your fears of the consequences can win out, and you can decide to stop the killing together.

Fox helpfully offers to stick around as neutral third party to hash things out, and Anan is forced to admit they have a communications link to Vendikar they haven't used but should still work.

As Anan finally has the realization the bloodshed just might truly stop, he peacefully leads Fox to the Vendikar comm link while Kirk orders the Enterprise to cancel General Order 24.

We cut back to the Enterprise later after they beamed back up (sans Fox, who stayed behind to be a diplomat), and Uhura informs Kirk Fox sent them a message saying the Magic 8-Ball looks good on Eminar and Vendikar finally stopping the killing.

McCoy and Spock get Kirk to admit he took a big gamble, but Kirk has a good counterpoint. The Eminar people were a very ordered society obviously terrified of the consequences of a real war, he offered them an even better alternative to what they had done to avoid it that would result in the final end to the bloodshed as well. Being rational people, they took the better way out.

As the episode ends, Spock thoughtfully concedes the point as he and Kirk have this exchange before the end credits.

Spock: Captain, you almost make me believe in luck.

Kirk: Spock, you almost make me believe in miracles.

(cue sardonic look from Spock and grin from Kirk as credits start)

This episode was less a "monster of the week" episode and more an examination of human nature. Given the series was produced during the height of the Cold War, the message was topical then but is still topical today.

No one who is aware of the horrors of an actual war wants one, and all of us want to avoid it, but the only true way to avoid all it's horrors is to truly not fight to begin with. Trying to have the cake of fighting while trying to deny the end results is as terrible, as it is just putting off the problem. Wars, even the sterile one the Eminar and Vendikar people fought, still resulted in those who shouldn't have died.

Peace, on the other hand, doesn't have to be permanent, but it can be if those who are fighting decide that the horror they want to avoid is more important to them than the urge to shed each other's blood, and while it's in our nature to wage war, that nature can be overcome, only if we are willing to do so.

Star Trek: The Original Series "The Doomsday Machine" episode review

This was recommended to me to review on the Kiwi Farms by a user there, so I decided to give a whirl.


We start the episode as Captain Kirk walks onto the bridge to get the news of a garbled distress call from a nearby solar system, only intelligible words being "Constellation." Worse, the planets in that system have all been destroyed.

Now, I know William Shatner gets accused of overacting, but his stunned "Wat?" to all this is actually pretty good.

As we cut to next scene, he's still in shock mode as Sulu reports yep, no sign their sensors were full of it, stuff is destroyed. However, Spock discovers the two innermost planets of the system they are currently investigating (as more than one seems to have been destroyed) seem to be intact. Also, given they are search for the "Constellation" and a starship currently lying adrift has it's distress beacon blinking on sensors, Kirk orders Sulu to head out to check on it.

As they approach the ship, Kirk realizes it suffered battle damage from whatever destroyed everything, orders a red alert, and they close in on the Constellation (a Constitution class vessel like the Enterprise) as we cut to opening credits.

As we cut back to the show, the Constellation has clearly suffered some serious damage all over the ship as the title card displays. After getting reports the Constellation bridge is uninhabitable but the rest of the ship has low but functional life support and thus life may be present (though subspace interference makes life signs hard to determine), he drops the alert to yellow, says he's going over with with McCoy, Scott, and a damage control team to check it out, leaves Spock the keys to the ship, then heads to the transporter room.

Once they beam over, Scott checks a nearby circuit panel and finds most of the wiring has shorted out, and if you pay attention, you can see he's missing part of a finger. He tried well to hide it on set, but James Doohan (Scott) lost part of that finger in WWII.

Anyway, they all split up to examine the ship, and it gets spooky fast. No one is around, and it's clear they had a warning shit went pear-shaped, no crap you'd expect like people drinking coffee during a break is obvious, so ship obviously was at battle stations when it got attacked. The two planets are considered as possibilities for where the crew went, but Spock calls and shoots that idea down, neither could sustain human life. They meet back up with Scott, who confirms the warp drive is dead and the phaser banks were definitely expended, but the impulse engines are still operable.

Kirk mentions the captain, Matt Decker, and indicates this is not how he'd expect to find his ship after an emergency.


Bit of an aside: Matt Decker is the father to Willard Decker from the first Star Trek movie, and the ST Novel "The Brave and the Bold, Part 1" has a "prequel" that explains how they know each other.


Scott has the idea they can check the captain's log backups from the still working ships computer, and as they head around to do that, they find Matt Decker (a Commodore, essentially a senior captain), and he's apparently in shock. McCoy gives him an adrenaline shot to get him responsive, and Kirk is all "Matt, what happened?"

He's a bit too insistent for Matt, who is still working off his shock, and McCoy tells Kirk to chill while Matt lets the adrenaline kick in. After a bit of waiting and Kirk ordering all records they find sent over to Spock to analyze, Decker finally gets his wits.

According to him, while the third planet in the system they are in was still around, what attacked his ship forced him to emergency beam the crew down because they were dead otherwise, and he did what any good captain does and stick around as the last man aboard.

As Kirk more gently tries to get more info out of Decker, Decker gets to utter the word "Hell" (a novelty on 1960s TV) when he says:

"They say there's no Devil....but right out of Hell I saw it!"

Kirk then decides to play a bit of hardball and asks about the crew on the third planet, telling the still PTSD riddled Decker the third planet isn't there anymore, and Decker starts crying, saying he's fully aware of that.

Before we go on, his actor did a great job showing a man who just watched a lot of people he tried to save die despite him and the shocked horrified aftermath.

Decker has a meltdown because he could do nothing to save them before the planet they were on was destroyed, and you just can't help but feel sorry for the man, as over four hundred lives died in vain because they all trusted him. As they leave Decker to work out the rest of his crying fit, Scott and Kirk come to the conclusion, based on the warp drive having flat-lined and all the interference they are still getting, that an energy dampening field hit the ship and crapped it out.

Decker finally snaps out of his funk and reveals he believes it to be a weapon and describes it being miles long and a maw that could "swallow a dozen star-ships". As they pump him for more info, he reveals they were investigating the "weapon" slicing up the late fourth planet with an anti-proton beam when it attacked them. They get in touch with Spock, who confirms this and adds it's apparently a machine that destroys planets and consumes the pieces for fuel, meaning it can keep going so long as it has planets to keep smashing up.

As Kirk is horrified, Spock reveals Sulu discovered worse news. This thing came from outside the galaxy and will continue destroying everything in theirs. McCoy wonders who built it, and Kirk doesn't know, he asks McCoy if he ever heard of the "Doomsday Machine". McCoy does the classic "I'm a doctor, not an X (mechanic being the X)", and Kirk segues into describing it.

The Doomsday Machine is supposed to be a device that could destroy both sides in a war, never meant to be used, but remaining as the ultimate bluff, and since Star Trek TOS was made while memories of WWII were still fresh, hydrogen bombs are referenced. Kirk postulates it was turned on, did it's job in another galaxy, and never stopped. Decker flips out and is all "who cares where it came from, how are we gonna stop it!"

Decker then has to be told to chill out when he insists on staying with his ship instead of heading to the Enterprise, but Kirk has to call him on the BS, saying the Constellation is dead, Decker can get more done on the Enterprise, and Kirk will be the one to ensure it gets towed. Decker calms down a bit, mumbles about he never lost a command before, and decides to cooperate.

As McCoy and Decker beam over, Spock gets Kirk on the horn and warns him the 'Doomsday Machine" (I'm shortening this to DM from now on) has come up on long range sensors, looking like a giant inverted worm. Worse, it just noticed the Enterprise, and like Decker said, it has one hell of a big mouth.

As we cut to the next scene, the Enterprise is hauling tail with the DM in pursuit. As Kirk asks Spock what their options are, he's not optimistic. It generates a massive amount of power, the subspace interference is severe as a result, and a direct attack could only get them killed. Kirk tells Spock it needs to be stopped NOW, Spock then decides to heed Kirk's request for a beam-out, which only makes the DM close in for the kill and fire a blast at it.

Thankfully, this was before the beaming, so Kirk and the away team are fine, but the Enterprise is damaged and Spock has to clear out for awhile, and he barely gets this to Kirk before the interference shorts out the comms. Kirk doesn't want to sit on his ass while his ship is getting attacked, so he tells Scott to work on the impulse engines while he tells Scott's assistant Washburne to stick around and help him get the ship view screen back online.

Meanwhile, we get some Spock and McCoy volleying insults as comic relief, then they notice the DM heading off for the next system with the Rigel colonies, and they make a discovery that anything under a certain size at a certain distance doesn't register to it as a threat. Spock decides to go pick up Kirk while keeping an eye on the DM, but Decker flips out and tries to pull rank, demanding they focus on the DM , citing the Rigel colonies. Spock is a bit annoyed as Decker flips his shit, and Spock has to remind Decker he does NOT have command of the Enterprise as he tells Sulu to follow his orders and ignore Decker.


Bit of an aside here, this would be correct naval protocol. While Decker would be senior in rank, his command was the Constellation, he would not have authority to commandeer another vessel in the same service unless the chain of command was dead or incapacitated and he was the only line officer who could take charge, at least in terms of rank alone being senior.


Decker then tries to fall back on his position as Commodore (which in a naval service is a captain in charge of other ships, essentially a halfway point between a captain and admiral) to take over since mere rank invoking didn't get his way, and Spock tells him he can do that, but all he'll do is get another ship and crew killed, pointing out Decker's plan to point blank phasers will be useless, the hull of the DM is solid neutronium and they don't have the firepower to do notable damage.

Decker gets his way, but not before protest from McCoy, who tries to get Spock to go along, but Spock and he have this dialogue.

Spock: Doctor, unless you can determine him physically or psychologically unfit for duty, I have to knuckle under.
McCoy: Okay then, he's unfit, on my authority.
Spock: You'll have to submit proof to make that stick.
McCoy: I haven't had time and you know it.

Decker practically troll faces the doctor and tells him to leave the bridge, and after one last token protest, he storms off the bridge. Decker then resumes barking orders, and after a brief stony silence, they reluctantly start taking his orders.

We then cut back to the Constellation as Commodore Matt "Ahab" Decker starts boring in on his white whale, where Scott tells Kirk the impulse engine circuits are locked up, so Kirk tells him to take anything not fried from the warp engines. Scott says "sure , but it's like hot-wiring a diesel engine's guts to an unleaded tank", and Kirk is all "do whatever it takes to get it working".

As Scott and Kirk go back to working on getting the Constellation to do more than idle, we cut back to Decker still going full retard. After a glancing shot from the DM that weakens the deflectors, Spock advises Decker to fall back, the deflectors will be fried if they get hit much more, Decker still wants to close in, and as we get a creepy shot of the Enterprise closing in on the DM, we cut back to where Kirk got the view-screen working finally as Scotty finishes hot-wiring the engines.

Kirk is then witness to Decker's fruitless attempts to do any damage whatsoever with phasers despite repeated shots, which the DM pretty much ignores as Decker reveals he had no better plan than "shoot it and hope it dies". Kirk desperately tries to get in touch with his ship, and desperately pleads for Scotty to get his jury-rigged engines up as he continues to watch Decker being an idiot with his ship.

The DM fires another glancing blow, and deflectors are fried. Worse, the DM is using a tractor beam to draw them in, and since warp engines just died, they have a minute to clear out before they are doomed. Decker doesn't give a shit and still wants to send them to their death cause his white whale needs destroyed, dammit.

Spock then reveals his trump card. Decker pretty much gave the command to commit suicide with the lives of the crew, and on that basis, Decker doesn't need a write-up by a doctor to be declared batshit insane, and Decker finally stands down and veers off.

Alas, it's too late, as they are being pulled inside.


As we cut back from the next intermission, Kirk is understandably trying to not lose his shit as he watches the Enterprise about to die and Scott finally gets those engines going. And, as Scott warned, the ship moves, but the engines freak out over the spit and pencil hotwire job and Kirk goes tumbling everywhere as the ship jerks and banks like crazy.Thankfully, the engines level out after being janky for a bit and Kirk can finally not wind up ass over tea kettle from the turbulence.

Thankfully, Scotty has some better news too. They have at least one bank of phasers Scott managed to recharge, and Kirk plans to use the Constellation as a lure to save the Enterprise. The plan works, but Decker is an idiot who doesn't realize Kirk was distracting the DM, not trying to kill it, as now it's Kirk who is in the firing line in a crippled ship. Worse, as Decker tries for another round of trying to kill it to no effect, Spock drops some truth bombs on Decker.

1. The DM is sucking in debris to refuel itself, the Enterprise can't recharge for a day at least.
2. They have only seven hours of power left before they are boned.
3. It will take a day for deflectors and warp drive to be repaired.

Decker is trying vainly to counter Spock's torrent of "this is being stupid, Commodore" rebuttals, and the comms woman interrupts and informs them they can finally contact the Constellation again. Decker takes the radio, and Kirk very quickly learns Decker was the moron who nearly got ANOTHER ship killed by being an imbecile.

Decker tries the rank pulling crap as well as hiding behind regulations to justify himself, but Kirk has had enough of Decker being an idiot and tells Spock HE'S ordering Decker be yanked out of the captain's chair. Spock complies, and Decker is all "You're bluffing" when Spock says he'll have Decker arrested.

Cue Spock signaling for security.

Upon realizing Spock will actually do it, Decker decides his dignity is worth a bit more than his pride. As Spock assumes command, he decides to make it stick by having security send Decker to sick bay to make sure Decker is on a leash.

We cut to Decker as Spock tells Kirk he's swinging around to pick him up, and Decker reveals he truly is batshit as he tries to overpower the security officer escorting him and appears to succeed after some hokey looking fighting moves.We cut to Decker sneaking off to the shuttle crafts as McCoy and the nurses go looking for the patient they were expecting. Meanwhile, Decker continues his mad tactical espionage action skills toward his goal.

We cut back to Kirk, who gets Scotty telling him they have 1/3 impulse and some weak shields. As Kirk tells Spock they'll meet for a pickup, Decker is sneaking off-ship in a shuttle. However, this does not go unnoticed by Sulu, and Spock immediately realizes who it is as he orders, too late, for the doors to shut.

Kirk catches on, and as he and the Enterprise hail Decker, an eerily calm Decker tells them he's well aware shooting it didn't work, so he's going to attempt a kamikaze run down the DM's throat. As Kirk and Spock try in vain to get Decker to turn back, Decker is obviously tormented by all the people who died because of his bad judgment call, and it's clear he means to atone for their deaths by using his own to destroy what killed them because of him.


Before I go on, Matt Decker's actor did an amazing job. Decker had this thousand-yard, soulless stare on his face, and the voice acting for the haunted man he clearly was playing was dead accurate.


As Kirk is freaking out, trying desperately to coax Matt away from his doom, Decker allows himself to be destroyed.


As we cut back from the next break, while Kirk is pissed Decker died for nothing, Spock and Sulu realized maybe Decker didn't, as the shuttlecraft exploding inside the DM actually weakened it a little. Kirk immediately seizes on this, the wheels in his brain turn as he realizes what that means, and he tells Spock to beam the away team save him and Scott back board as he plans to send the Constellation down the DM's throat, figuring a much larger vessel will choke it to death, especially if he can have the Constellation blow up inside the DM.

Spock is skeptical but realizes it's worth a shot, so he decides to check on things from his end while Kirk works on his.As Kirk finishes things, Spock admits sensors can't determine if this is going to work. Kirk is all "well, best plan we got", and Kirk repeats Decker's intention to ram the ship he's in down the DM's throat.

Spock is reassured Kirk isn't suicidal, he plans to beam himself and Scott out after the kamikaze course is set in stone, but Spock reminds Kirk the transporter is still fluky and the plan is still risky. Kirk is all "screw it, don't have better options".

Kirk has Scott arm the bomb, then has him beam aboard. Scott makes it, but determines the transporter is crapping out fast. Scott hauls ass to work on that as Kirk begins the death run. Scott barely gets it working and Kirk tells them to haul him out on his signal.

Kirk waits until he's damn sure the bomb is gonna be drawn in, then makes the order, but the transporter shits itself again. As Scott works like crazy, Kirk is about to go the way of Decker as Sulu counts down, and the transporter crew takes advantage of a brief restoration of power and crosses their fingers.

The Constellation cooks off right inside the maw of the DM, and as what looks like a neon road flare explodes, it dies.

And as we cut back to the transporter room, Kirk is still holding his communicator as the transporter crew is all "0_0 HE'S ALIVE!

As Kirk makes up to his bridge, Spock realizes the DM has gone dead. As he does, Kirk and Spock decide to preserve Matt Decker's dignity posthumously by noting officially he died in the line of duty (omitting the parts where he went full Captain Ahab). Kirk also notes, commenting on hydrogen bombs again, it's ironic they had to blow up the fusion reactor of a star-ship, effectively an H-Bomb of their own, to destroy another doomsday device.

After a bit of idle wondering whether there are more "doomsday machines" around, Kirk admits he doesn't know, but he found one more than enough.

Cue him and Spock sharing a brief sardonic look and grin as we cut to credits.



Overall, this was a good episode. Acting was on point, the monster of the week wasn't too contrived, the moral message was subtle yet effective, and it's theme is still a good one about the dangers of ultimate weapons and their power to destroy not only by how they kill, but how their use only leads others to their own destruction in turn.

Assuming The Worst About People: Humanity's Deadliest Disease

It's been awhile since I took some time to discuss a topic of this nature, but I just wanted to sit down for a moment and share some personal thoughts about the more disappointing aspects of human nature.

Whether you believe in religion or not, most people concur the mass majority of us tends toward seeing the worst. Because even the average atheist will concede we are far from perfect, it's human nature to be suspicious of anyone claiming a virtue. They expect that, not entirely unreasonably, to be another shoe to drop.

To be fair, this is partially based on some truth. Since so much of humanity tends to see the worst in others, believing terrible things about them is easy, and from that it becomes easier to rationalize anything good about them as being a smokescreen for them being as bad if not worse than you believe they really are. The more you convince yourself someone is a horrible human being, the more confirmation bias drives you to take whatever truth you learn about them and interpret it in the most evil, petty, and twisted light. This also drives you to invent the most terrible lies to supplement that biased slant on truth, and by the time you are done, you've convinced yourself someone is the devil incarnate.

This happens quite often in politics and other fields where strong differences of opinion become radically polarized, and it occurs in any area of human endeavor where strong differences of opinion turn into a bitter brinkmanship game of "Us v. Them". Unfortunately, while the more rational among us would be able to step back and realize maybe a difference of opinion isn't reason to deserve a lynching, the more extreme members of each side have the line between beliefs and the people who hold them blur to nonexistence and that's when we get name-calling and violence entering the picture when sanity takes too long to reassert itself.

The thing I try to remember to keep myself from become utterly depressed with humanity is such activity can be avoided. If you focus on what can be proven, avoid making things up about people, examine all evidence about the person and their views with as little bias as possible, and doing you best to remember behind your conceptions is an actual human being, then it becomes very possible to avoid becoming yet another evil, twisted, petty soul who sees the worst in everyone and twists them into monsters because you are so full of bitterness you can't bring yourself to believe there is no good left in them.

I won't pretend I'm immune. Like all imperfect people, I've been no better and I won;t pretend I haven't been a hypocrite before. I'd be lying not just to the world but also myself if I tried to insist otherwise, and I don't like to do either.

That all said, I do believe keeping that in mind is one of the first steps to avoid catching what I consider humanity's deadliest disease, or at least not getting more sick because of it.

Just played and beat Super Robot Wars T, my thoughts

I eventually plan to review this game for ChristCenteredGamer, so I'll save any content related to it's technical merits for that, so I mostly just want to talk about the plot and translation.


First off, the plot. While the past few games in Super Robot Wars have been dimension hopping and that was getting a bit old, this game, while still having you briefly visit a few other dimensions, still mostly takes place in Earth's solar system. I wasn't exactly one of those people who hated the dimension hopping plots, but it's nice to see the writers don't have to use that as a crutch to write a decent crossover plot, they wrote something that uses that only when necessary, not to justify every single part of the plot.

Second, they added Captain Harlock, Cowboy Bebop, and Magic Knight Rayearth. They did a good job making sense of all the above, I'm happy to say. Feel a little potential was missed with Cowboy Bebop, but it's a credit to the writers they made it make as much sense as it did. As for MKR, the writers had to take a lot of creative liberties with it, but they were fairly logical and mostly boiled down to them speeding up to when the mecha showed up, and I'm very impressed how well it fit.



The translation, on the other hand, is a mixed bag. For the most part, it's quite competent, at least if you walked into an SRW game completely blind. Since I've played a few before, I was more than a bit weirded out they used the American dubs of several shows as a base, as they usually just do a direct translation from the Japanese dubs, but aside from some issues I have with how the Magic Knight Rayearth plot turned out (although they are ultimately kinda forgivable) in the context of the crossover, I'm otherwise not going to complain.

Still think SRW V made fewer mistakes overall, but the SRW T translation is still pretty good even with the mistakes it made. Unlike The Moon Dwellers, it's not so terrible it looks like an obvious Google Translate job.


As for whether I enjoyed it, worth every penny, and that includes the DLC which was well worth the purchase, even if navigating the Hong Kong Nintendo eShop was a pain.

Iran and the US are gearing up for conflict, but it not a war I'd like to see, if that's what this is

As I write this, Iran is retaliating against the US for taking their head cloak and dagger man, who provably incited terrorists to attack one of our embassies.

As to taking down said inciter, they brought blood on their own head by hurting Americans and he paid the price for it. It's regrettable either side shed blood, but it is what it is.

But now it looks like there might be even more conflict that becomes a war over this, and I find nothing to be happy about. It was likely inevitable, and I doubt it could have been avoided, but killing people is nothing no one should be cheering for, at least not if you aren't a murderous animal.

If US troops have to fight this out, they have my support as an American citizen, but I hope their deaths are as few as possible and it ends as quickly as possible. As for the Iranians, I hope common sense breaks out and they decided to put down the sword before too many of them die by it. Enough have died already.

As for me, I'm going to have a lot to pray about, and since I can't do much about my worries, I'm turning it over to a higher power.

In the meantime, and I address both sides, it's in your mortal hands to quit killing one another and stopping this before it goes too far. For both your sakes, I strongly urge you heed that.

In Which I Take Apart The Post Where Brianna Wu Denies Being Transgender

Note: This post used to be on Medium.com until it was taken down for a rules violation, which I have not contested. I am rehosting it here and hereby release it for anyone to rehost wherever they please, just link back to this original to show where you got it.

I’m taking a trip down memory lane to take apart a long ago GamerGhazi post by Brianna Wu where HE (read one of my earlier Medium posts if you want to see why I no longer humor John Flynt’s wishes to refer to him by female pronouns) say he refuses to comment on the subject of his being transgender.

Brianna Wu: Why I don't respond when Gamergate accuses me of being tr...
This is a post I've been meaning to write for a long time now. Every single day, I have Gamergaters writing to call me…archive.is

(Original in italic, my comments in regular font)

This is a post I’ve been meaning to write for a long time now. Every single day, I have Gamergaters writing to call me transgender. Somewhere along the way, it became something they all seem to believe when the truth is I’ve never commented on it.

We don’t have to have your input. Your past has been reconstructed pretty well without any need for your input despite how much you’ve tried to bury it, right down to when it happened, the transgender forums where you were eventually expelled from, and from then on all the way up to the present.

If you aren’t transgender, I will personally pay you my life savings in apology, and I’m confident I won’t have to hand you a dime.

I’ve thought a lot about it. I’ve talked to friends like Katherine Cross, Christina Love and Samantha Allen about this. I think it’s a no-win scenario to respond to for a plethora of reasons.

The first and most obvious one is, there’s nothing remotely wrong with being transgender! If I were cis and I came out saying, “Oh my God, no! I’m not transgender! No, no, no!” that’s just reinforcing this stigma about being transgender that costs so many lives. I think transgender people are probably the most persecuted people on the planet, and I don’t think it’s helpful for cisgendered activists to inadvertently reinforce this.

I think transgender people are probably the most persecuted people on the planet, and I don’t think it’s helpful for cisgendered activists to inadvertently reinforce this.

See the bolded part? We have an admission up front this is an OPINION.

Secondly, anyone familiar with the subject knows there are many, many shades to being transgender! There are intersex people, there are non-binary people, there are deep stealth people. Ultimately, being transgender is a private, very serious medical issue that needs to be addressed as early in life as possible. I don’t think it’s helpful to anyone involved to treat it like a litmus test, where a person must come out publicly.

Ordinarily, I agree, and as a matter of basic decency, I agree with that for transgender people by default, but not with you, because you’ve presented yourself as a genuine (as in born cisgender) woman when you’re not. You’ve even gotten Wikipedia to repeat that lie for you and have gotten various websites to suppress information even hinting you weren’t born male as “deadnaming” (which is admitting it’s true, otherwise, your former identity would be “fakenaming” if false).

Basically, I don’t have a problem with you being a transwoman, I have a problem when you lie about being an actual woman and having been born as one when it can be proven otherwise.

Also, simple challenge for you: Would you mind if someone took your DNA and tested it to see if your chromosomes are male? No one needs your permission if it’s taken from a public place (like a paper cup you toss in a public trash can), and I’m sure a simple lab test could easily tell the world the truth, much like it would make Shaun King’s life easier if he would do the same on the subject of whether he’s black or not.

Thirdly, for anyone that’s publicly transgender — I’ve had friends that are out tell me about the pain it causes in it coloring everything that they do. I have a friend that’s a well known software engineer. She’s has people writing her all the time about how inspiring she is. She appreciates the sentiment, but she says it brings her back to the most painful period of her life. In becomes an adjective in front of that person’s name — coloring everything they do when the goal was to just feel like their true self.

You’ve just identified the crux of why people care: You’ve gone so far to deny it and have been so deliberately deceptive about it, especially given how often you claim to speak for all women (which you have not been in any way except on a cosmetic level for the past several years) that examination of your past reveals you’ve lied about quite a bit and still do to this day. If you had just admitted up front: “I’m trans, what of it”, and moved on with your life, I doubt hardly anyone would be bringing this up now, but because you went so far to conceal the sunrise, it should be no surprise when people point out the sun overhead despite your wish to conceal it.

The only winning move here is not to play.

But you did. You lied, you got caught, and you refuse to admit your deception.

I choose to not respond, because nothing I can say in response to this accomplishes anything worthwhile. And it’s my suggestion to others to not buy into transphobia by responding. It encourages something that should be deeply private to become a witchhunt.

When your entire history hinges on the lie you were born cisgender and it can be proven you are transgender, it became a matter of public interest because you went out of your way to deceive people concerning your feminist positions, as they were based on the lie you were born cisgender.

As Anita so eloquently said, transgender women are women period.

As in Anita Sarkeesian? To paraphrase some transgender women who DON’T deceive people and for whom I have greater respect (which is why I won’t mention their real or dead names), you have be trans to understand what a trans person has to go through, so by that premise, you have no right to speak about transphobia if you aren’t trans, since you don’t have any knowledge how terrible that really is for transgender women, a subject a REAL transgender woman would have more knowledge of, assuming you have been telling the truth about being born cisgender.

Further, Anita was provably born cisgender, so by the token of the very culture you are falsely appropriating (you were born cisgender, right?), Anita has no right to speak about the plight of being transgender, since she’s not herself.