For all the crazy aliens the Enterprise runs into, there's an awful lot of death floating out there in the universe. It seems hardly a week goes by without Kirk stumbling across ghosts or remnants or the remarkably well-preserved security system of some long gone civilization. This is a convenient storytelling out, because we don't know what the dead race was capable of, but it's also creepy if you think about it too long. (And given how much time I've put into this show now, I've thought about nearly every aspect of the series too long.) Each new history of loss adds to a picture of a cosmos haunted by failures. It's remarkable there's room to move. And I can't help thinking of Poltergeist, and what happens when you try and building a house on top of a cemetery.
This week, we've got two different haunts assaulting the Enterprise. Neither one is intentionally hostile, but both cost lives. Now, it makes sense that contact with an alien race would present innumerable challenges, and that many of those challenges would be potentially fatal to either party. But at least when you're dealing with the living, there's a chance of shared of logic, of a connection. (Okay, if you go by Stanislaw Lem, it's an incredibly slim chance, but stay with me.) When dealing with automatons and left-over need, there's not a whole lot of mutual interests to discuss. Mercy doesn't enter into it, because mercy is irrelevant. Either you find a way to beat the system on its own terms, or you blow up. And even if you do win, you don't get to mack on any hot alien babes, which is a total bummer.
There is an alien babe in "That Which Survives," but going by what happens to the guys she manages to touch, it ain't worth it. The Enterprise finds a strange planet whose development doesn't suit its age, so what the hell, Kirk and a few of the guys beam down to check things out. Spock stays behind to run the ship, and after an earthquake that throws the Enterprise 1000 light years away, we get two parallel storylines running for most of the remainder of the episode: Spock and Scotty trying to get back to the mystery planet, and Kirk, McCoy, Sulu, and a couple of soon-to-be-dead guys trying to find a way to survive in a place where all the vegetation is poisonous and there's hardly a drop of water to be found.
There's a third story, actually, that connects those two, and in the end provides an explanation for both—the mystery of the lady in purple who keeps appearing on both the planet and the ship, and generally making a nuisance (and worse) of herself in both places. We'll get to that in a second, but for my money, the most exciting elements of "Survives" were also the most immediate ones. Star Trek only brings up practical concerns when it needs those concerns to create suspense, so it's still refreshing to see Kirk and the others so concerned about basic human needs. It doesn't play hugely into the episode overall, since the Enterprise returns before thirst and hunger can become too debilitating, but just having that pressure running in the background of a handful of scenes forces you to think more about how tenuous that five-year exploratory mission truly is. The Enterprise is a technological marvel, state of the art, full of medical equipment and machines so far beyond our current capabilities as to appear like magic. But take that away, have something go wrong, and all that fictional innovation is meaningless. A strange planet is as bad as a desert island; worse, because it's a lot harder to contact passing ships. It's good to be reminded how quickly a situation can turn deadly.
Admittedly, having Spock watch your back makes the deadliness a lot less oppressive. Another element of "Survives" that worked well was Spock's dickishness while in command. I've been frustrated before by episodes that try too hard to mock his stoicism, but this one managed to show the half-Vulcan at his best and his worst, his cool competence holding back panic in the crew, while at the same time his refusal to practice even the most basic courtesies pushing everyone's stress to its limit. Spock's rationality looks best when he's observing human foolishness while someone else gives orders. When he's in authority, his insistence on pointing out how foolish everyone else is makes him hard to like; and honestly, I think that's cool. Characters are more interesting when you have to work a little to appreciate them, and it's still possible to identify with Spock even while you cringe at his behavior. There's an outsider-type in a lot of TV, a lone member of an otherwise harmonious social group who constantly asks the most awkward questions and points out the often irrational behavior of everyone around him or her. This type is often easier to identify with than the so-called "normals," because everyone feels like an outsider to varying degrees, and most of us have struggled under the illusion that everyone is working off of some ridiculous system that we can't see for ourselves. So I like seeing Spock being dickish and cold every once in a while, because thought I can't condone it, I can relate to it, and that makes his moments of empathy and respect all the more earned.
And as for that third story… Well, apparently the Genesis planet of Star Trek III wasn't the first really, really big mistake in the universe, because the "ghost planet" that Kirk and the others are marooned on was created by a civilization that died out shortly after. When they created the planet, they created a deadly disease, which wound up killing everybody, and now all that's left is a really terrible vacation spot, and a security system that sends out drones (all of whom look like the same hot chick) specifically designed to kill certain targets. It's a neat concept, but it doesn't really explain why the supposedly "noble" woman who served as the model for the drones would create a system this aggressive in its destructive capabilities. What is there on the ghost planet to protect? And once the Enterprise gets thrown far, far away, why does a drone sabotage the engines so the ship will explode? I mean, there's a difference between hanging up on a phone solicitor, and driving to that person's house and setting it on fire. The flames might be pretty and the screams from inside might sound like music, but there's gotta be, like, a line, y'know?
Honestly, I just don't think these super-smart, super-dead races really plan very well for what happens after they're gone. Like how some people don't make out a will when they really ought to, only here, it's creating crazy powerful death machines, which there really isn't ever an appropriate time for. At least the machine in "Survives" is basically constrained to a single location. In "The Lights of Zetar," we've got a giant glowing cloud of "desire" that floats around the vacuum looking for libraries to destroy. That's downright unneighborly, like killing all the local dogs because your landlord won't allow pets. Or something. (It's very, very late right now.)