TOS: Season 3, Episode 5, “Is There In Truth No Beauty?” (Jan 26, 2020)

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Series and Season: Star Trek: The Original Series, Season 3

Episode #,and Episode Name: 5 – “Is There In Truth No Beauty?”

Setting the Stage: I started at 6:30 pm, still watching via Netflix and using their viewing order. As it is laundry day, and we stopped for dinner, it took me almost 2 hours to watch this episode. I fully intended to watch a second episode while I worked out, but it’s already 9:30 and I am exhausted. Travel will do that to you, kids. Well, travel and grocery shopping, and four loads of laundry, and walking your dog, and… yeah. Tempura, the husband, and Professor Zoom were all in attendance for the entire episode. I’m pretty sure Jazz and Thor made a cameo appearance, but Loki still wants absolutely nothing to do with Star Trek.

Tonight I write to the melodies of Minus the Bear and The London Symphony Orchestra (Star Wars: A New Hope soundtrack). I also have one very tired puppy sleeping next to me, who clearly missed me while I was out of town. I am missing New York; my friends, their cats, and the fooooood (salty Italian meats and pizza to be exact), but it is good to be home with my furbabies.

Quick Summary with my Impressions: “Is There In Truth No Beauty?” Apparently humans go nuts when they see Medusans, and the Enterprise is picking up an ambassador and some assistants to transfer. Vulcans, however, may use a visor so Spock gets to greet Dr. Jones and Ambassador Kollos; or as I like to call him the “ambassador in a box”. Looks like Spock has met his personality match with Dr. Jones, and I am loving her outfit. Why do I want to cosplay all of the things?

Kirk says “fascinating” and I’m howling with laughter, it was well timed. All of the men, including Spock, are head over heels with Dr. Jones at dinner, but something is wrong and she leaves for her quarters. Apparently Larry has the hots for Dr. Jones and shares a passionate kiss with her; he wants her and she wants to go away with the ambassador to do her work. Oh poor, dumb Larry – he looked at the ambassador and runs away, whereas Dr. Jones doesn’t even need the visor apparently, interesting. Larry gets into it with Scotty in the engine room and puts the Enterprise into unknown space, and then he dies. Kirk is being flirty with Dr. Jones to try and distract her from stopping Spock, but he’s also being a pushy bastard telling her she is young and shouldn’t give up her youth for something “ugly”. Oh snap, Miranda is blind… that’s why she can deal with the Kollos. Spock does some Vulcan mind magic to bind with Kollos, and WHY IS SPOCK LAUGHING and SMILING? This is weird. After the crisis is averted, and the Enterprise is back to where they needed to be, Spock needs to reverse the mind meld but he forgets the visor. Kirk believes Dr. Jones made Spock forget the visor and he berates her, but she understands Spock needs to be cured and she tries to help. As they leave, why was Kirk standing in the transporter room NOT wearing a visor? They made SUCH a big deal of it at the top of the episode and then just forget? Sigh.

Not only is this apparently the “season of the brunette”, but it’s also where Spock gets to have some “romantic” interludes with some of the female guest stars – in the most Spock was ever, of course. I liked that there were several hints to why Dr. Jones was different than other humans, but the reveal about her being blind truly stunned those on the ship (and likely many viewers). I also believe this marks the first person with no vision on the show, and aside from McCoy being a bit snotty to her about not being able to fly the ship, it was not made into a big deal. For the 1960’s, Star Trek was pretty diverse and progressive in some ways, and in others it was just a product of the time. Overall this was not a terrible episode, but it wasn’t all that great either. 6 tiny piglets running through the mud for this episode.

The one question I have for Spock is: What’s in the box?

TA out!