Plot: What’s it about?
Episode #21-“A Taste of Armageddon”>>>Airdate 2/23/67
On a mission to pick up a diplomat, the crew of the Enterprise discovers that this is no mere mission. Upon trying to pick up Robert Fox, the Enterprise is greeted with news that the home planet of Fox has been at war with a neighboring planet for more than 500 years. A most unusual war though, it’s done entirely with computers and when one side declares a casualty, the citizens of the opposing planet voulantarly walk into an antimatter chamber where they are summarliy killed instantly.
Kirk and Spock and the crew of the Enterprise are declared “casualities” of war and are expected to give themselves up and walk into the antimatter chamber. Do they? Of course not, what would an episode of Star Trek be without Kird spouting out lines of denial. Scotty, who is in charge of the ship in their absense will not lower shields to make all of this happen, and is so seems that the crew is in big trouble…
Episode #22-“Space Seed”>>>Airdate 2/16/67
A great prequel to the upcoming feature film “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan”, quite possibly the most liked and financially successful of all the Star Trek movies. This episode introduces us to the character of Khan played by Ricardo Montalban when they stumble across the S.S. Botany Bay. The Botnay Bay is an old style pre warp, sleeper ship that contains the bodies of a Khan stongman.
Although disappearing without a trace then, Khan reveals what we saw in The Wrath of Khan, the man who conquered a quarter of the Earth. Kirk is forced to depend for survival on the dictator’s new lover, the adoring ship’s historian and seeming traitor to the crew. Certainly one of the better episodes to come along, if not one of the more popular as well.
Video: How does it look?
Star Trek has never looked better, being that these episodes are more than 30 years old, they look great. Shown in their original full screen ratio, the colors are bright and vivid. The very colorful uniforms of the crew really stand out and all those blinking lights and buttons make it like you’re watching it for the first time (and for me, it was). While lacking in comparison to some of the full frame transfers, it’s understandable. If you’re a die hard Trekkie, this is the only way to go.
Audio: How does it sound?
The audio is presented in Dolby Digital 2.0. It’s basically a mono soundtrack, but has some directional effects that I didn’t expect. The “zapping” of the phasers and especially the beaming up and down sounds are neat and have a high pitched effect. Still, for a TV show that’s 30 years old, the sound isn’t that bad.
Supplements: What are the extras?
There are trailers for each of the episodes.
