I take notes when I watch Trek episodes for recapping. I do that for every show I watch. I don't spend all that much time directly referring to those notes when I do the actual write-up, but I like having the information there if I need it. There's probably something to be said for the way jotting down plot details, character names, and dialog helps to give me a clearer sense of what each episode is about, making it easier to remember details and create a structure for the review. Whatever the exact reason, I've found that whenever I've tried to put together an essay on a movie or show without notes, I get nervous.
I mention this as a way of apologizing for the sketchiness of my comments on "Wink Of An Eye," because, despite the fact that I know I had my laptop open and I typed repeatedly throughout the episode, my notes for it have mysteriously vanished. Maybe I deleted them when I opened the file to take notes on "The Empath." Maybe I put them in a different file. Maybe I was hallucinating, because it's been that kind of a week, and I gotta be honest with you, I'm not completely convinced that I'm writing this right now. This could all be some kind of stress dream, and in a moment or two, the letters on the keys will change into some language that cuts my fingers and my monitor will slam down on my hands and eat them. (The only benefit to this being a nightmare is that at least I could be sleeping right now.)
Anyway. "Wink of an Eye," what I remember. Of the two episodes this week, "Eye" is easily the best—not great, but at least it feels like a Trek episode, as opposed to "The Empath," which plays like one of those awful hour-long Twilight Zones. Responding to a distress call from a planet with no recorded life forms… again… Kirk and co find a beautiful, culturally advanced city that's entirely empty of inhabitants. (The beauty aspect is apparently important, as Scotty mentions it in the supplemental Captain's Log.)(Which is odd. Why is Scotty recording a log? I was under the impression that Kirk was in charge of the Captain's Log, and that other crew members recorded entries only when Kirk wasn't available to do so. Admittedly, Kirk is on the planet when the episode begins, but he hasn't been there that long, and surely the log entry can wait till gets back. Maybe it's that officers each have their own journals, which would make sense, or there's a specific time the Log needs to be recorded each day. But I like to imagine, given James Doohan's well-known animosity towards Shatner, that Scotty is just taking the next step torwards attaining complete control of the ship. After all, it's Kirk's fault that the poor Enterprise keeps going on all these mechanically damaging adventures.)
It seems like most every episode we've seen in season 3 has had our heroes visiting planets with no discernible life forms, only to be immediately accosted by those life forms upon beaming down. At least "Eye" gives the computer an excuse for its error. The citizens of Scalos (the planet) (thanks, Wikipedia!) are really, really, really fast. So fast that it's impossible to see them in "normal" speed, so fast that when they talk it sounds like a buzzing insect—so fast that they can dodge phaser fire. The accident that Barry Allen-ed everyone also made them sterile, and now a once thriving civilization is down to its last nine members. The distress call that attracted the Enterprise is a lure to give the Scalosians a chance at some fresh meat. That's why a red-shirt named Compton disappears on Scalos, and that's why Deela, a Scalosian, drugs Kirk's coffee and winds him up to her level. She likes him. She really, really likes him.
As threats go, the Scalosians aren't bad, although their willingness to give the hero of the show a drug that will make it possible for him to defeat them is a little suspect. They manage to beam aboard the Enterprise somehow, which doesn't make a lot of sense, science-wise. If their speed makes them invisible to the computer as life-forms, how would the transporter even work? Especially since they get brought on without anyone on the ship realizing it. Their sabotage of the Enterprise's control systems makes clever use of their undetectability (Spock's reversal of that sabotage makes for a cute episode button), and there's something, well, creepy is a stretch, but certainly unsettling about a threat whose presence can only be recognized in the aftermath. (For a better use of this idea, check out the great later series episode of Dr. Who, "Blink.") In fact, the ep might've been stronger if it had spent more time focusing on the mystery, and the danger that mystery represented, instead of dropping Kirk down the rabbit hole and spoiling the question so early on.
Once Kirk crosses over, though, the situation progresses as expected. Deela is hot for him, the leader of the Scalosians, who is also into Deela, is less fond. The actor who plays the latter, Jason Evers, was also the lead of the wacky, "My wife's a head I've got in the basement, who can I kill so I can have some sex again?" b-flick, The Brain That Wouldn't Die. (Brain was used in a great MST3K episode, as well as source material for feminist graduate students searching for thesis topics.) Evers' performance in "Eye" can best be described as "perfunctory," and apart from Deela, none of the other Scalosians make any impression at all. We have our main danger, a machine that's screwing with the life support system, and we have our obstacles, and then it's just a matter of Kirk and eventually Spock teaming up to fix things. (We even have McCoy coming up with a magical cure for the super speed.)
But like I said, it wasn't horrible. The hook is clever, if undercooked, and I did get a kick out of Spock following in Kirk's footsteps without hesitating, and Kirk, in turn, reacting to his arrival as if it was an entirely expected turn of events. I'd label this as "functional." The triangle between Deela, Kirk, and Evers is a familiar one, and given such a rich main concept, it's a shame that there wasn't more an attempt made to take advantage of the possibilities. There are hints: Compton, the red-shirt, dies of "cellular damage," which apparently the newly turned are vulnerable to, but once this is raised, it's quickly dropped. It's not like Kirk is going to die, after all, though it's surprising the Scalosians don't get some kind of comeuppance for all the kidnapping and manslaughter they're responsible for. (They explain that when their numbers began to drop, they created the distress signal to attract new blood, but the super-speed transition tends to kill weaker, non-Kirk humanoids.)