65 – Plato’s Stepchildren

Grade: D-

Summary

The Enterprise receives an urgent medical emergency message from an alien planet. The people there possess strong psychokinetic powers, but have lost the ability to fight disease. They hope to convince Doctor McCoy to stay with them.

Commentary

Here’s another stupid episode. The scene where Kirk and Spock have to play Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum is just so hard to watch. Actually, all the scenes are hard to watch. I think everyone knew by then that this show would be cancelled. This episode is just awful.

Actually the only thing I didn’t mind about this episode was the kiss between Kirk and Uhura. But I do wish it was more natural and not forced.

Of Note

This episode was banned by the BBC, but not for the interracial kiss. It was actually deemed too violent and too sadistic for regular television. It was never shown on television there until 1993.

This actually was not the first time a kiss between two people of different races was shown on TV. That honor actually belongs to Nancy Sinatra and Sammy Davis Jr., who kissed one year before on “Movin’ with Nancy.”