Star Trek tends
to avoid family attachments, which makes Spock unique because we get
to meet his parents. Apart from Sarek and Amanda the only direct
family seen on screen is Kirk's brother who was already dead when he
appeared in
Operation - - Annihilate! It's a reflection of how
television storytelling changed that by the time
Star Trek: The
Next Generation was broadcast it was more unusual for family not
to appear. Picard's brother turned up, as did Riker's Dad, Worf's
brother, Troi's mother, Data's father and brother (not bad for an
android), La Forge's father, and Beverly Crusher and Wesley were of
course mother and son. Tasha Yar and Doctor Pulaski are the only
regular characters whose relatives don't pop in for a visit.
The
downside of having family come to stay is that it's a plotline which
is often used very badly to add a little emotional jeopardy to a
story. The death of Kirk's brother in
Operation - - Annihilate!
should be the lynch pin of the script but it barely seems to register
and Kirk displays more concern about Spock's blindness. Likewise the
appearance of Riker's father in The Icarus Factor is
the cue for a painfully generic story about grumpy Mr Riker and his
son's daddy issues caused by never hearing the old man say he loved
him. In the end the pair fight, and bond, and the emotional scars are
healed just in time for the end of the episode when old Mr Riker
leaves and is never heard from again. Of course the alternative
doesn't always work either. Babylon 5's commander
John Sheridan had a healthy relationship with his father but this
just resulted in scenes of Sheridan going on about the wonderfulness
of his dad.
D.
C. Fontana's script for Journey To Babel gives
Spock and Sarek a familiar father/son television relationship; Sarek
disapproves of Spock's life choices and Spock wants to please his
dad. The unique strength of the story is it focuses on the two
characters who can never hug and admit their true feelings for each
other. For an idea of how painfully this plot could have been handled
just give Spock and Sarek some of the more turgid dialogue from The
Icarus Factor.
SAREK:
I should have explained this to you a long time ago, but it hurt too
much. Then the wall grew up between us. ... You know, it's funny. I
can talk to a whole roomful of admirals about anything in the galaxy,
but I can't talk to you about how I feel.
SPOCK:
How do you feel?
SAREK:
How do you think? I love you, son. I've got to get back to the
Starbase.
SPOCK:
I know. I'm glad you came.
[They
embrace]
SAREK: Be careful now, okay?
Instead
the pair's relationship is played out by proxy, through the reactions
of the characters who can admit to feeling emotion. So we see Kirk's
embarrassment at Sarek's dismissive treatment of his son, and
Amanda's fury as Spock tries to hide behind logic to justify risking his father's life by delaying taking part in a medical procedure. However, just because Spock will not admit to feeling emotion doesn't
mean he has no emotional needs. One of the pleasing aspects of the
story is the way Spock seems to be making decisions based on what he
imagines will gain Sarek's approval rather than choosing his own
path; the cause of the original split between the pair. In the
agreement scene with Amanda, Spock has a line which starts, “can
you imagine what my father would say...” Even at a crisis point
he's trying to second guess his father's reaction. Some interesting
light is shone on Spock's character because while he is attempting to
be more Vulcan than other Vulcans he makes a couple of silly
mistakes.
Most obvious is the one Spock admits to, not
recognising the Orion ship and realising it is on a suicide mission.
As Kirk says to Spock, “you might have had something else on your
mind.” Secondly, Spock obviously believes not informing Kirk that
Ambassador Sarek is his father will demonstrate he is above such
petty family ties and emotional concerns. Actually by not passing all
relevant information on to his commanding officer Spock leaves Kirk
looking badly prepared in front of the ambassador from Vulcan. The
jury is out on whether Spock makes a third mistake in refusing to
take part in McCoy's operation once Kirk is injured. “We're
carrying over one hundred valuable Federation passengers. We're being
pursued by an alien ship. We're subject to possible attack. There has
been murder and attempted murder on board. I cannot dismiss my
duties,” is Spock's summary of the situation. He's right but he
fails to add that Sarek will definitely die if the operation does not
begin soon. Sarek is arguably the most important of all the
Federation passengers; as Gav says, “in council, his vote carries
others.” Sarek's death could derail or seriously delay admission of
the Coridan planets. Essentially Spock is balancing a known risk
against an unknown risk. The Enterprise might not be attacked by the
mystery ship. There might not be another murder among the passengers.
Sarek will die.
Journey To Babel
is a character piece and the relationships and interplay of the
characters are skilfully handled as you would expect from the writer
of This Side Of Paradise. Unfortunately
the plot itself is less assured. It is fussy and overcomplicated,
like the Orion plan to destabilise the negotiations by killing an
ambassador and making Sarek look like a suspect and also by killing
Captain Kirk, and also by destroying the Enterprise.
Journey To Babel
seems to be trying to pull off
the same trick as The City On The Edge Of Forever a
story that packs a lot of material into its four acts. The key
difference is that The City On The Edge Of Forever
moves forwards in a clear, linear fashion from medical accident to
alien artefact to time travel to love story and wherever the story
goes it is always being driven by the search for Doctor
McCoy. By contrast Journey To Babel begins
by focusing on diplomatic tensions among the ambassadors, then
becomes a murder mystery when Sarek becomes an obvious suspect in the
death of Gav the Tellarite ambassador. Spock's 'hey my Dad could
totally have murdered this dude' moment is yet another attempt to
impress Sarek with his logic and dispassionate assessment, Spock must
have been secretly delighted when Sarek says, “I quite agree.”
However, Gav's body is barely cold before Sarek collapses and the
story becomes a medical drama, and finally an Enterprise in peril
story as the mystery ship which has been shadowing the Enterprise
moves in to attack. By the end of the story the ambassadors have been
more or less forgotten and Gav's murder is never solved; the audience
is left to assume he was killed by Thelev the Orion agent but no one
ever accuses him and he never confesses. What's missing is something
to gell these different plots together, as the hunt for McCoy does in
The City On The Edge Of Forever,
the obvious candidate is the poor relationship between Spock and his
father but that storyline parallels the action on board the
Enterprise rather than affecting it directly.
Joseph
Pevney directs and while he can't add much visual excitement to the
grey corridors of the Enterprise he does create some striking images.
Most obviously there's the reception with the assorted
alien ambassadors rendered in a variety of different colours and
styles. The scene begins with a single take following a pair of
gold-painted dwarves, each wearing robes and what appears to be a
knitted fez. As Kirk's captain's log fills us in on the situation the
two ambassadors push their way between another pair of delegates
having an animated conversation and then pass along a buffet laid
with brightly coloured space food and drink, before the moving camera
comes to rest on Kirk's group. Expensive prosthetics are restricted
to the major alien delegates, the blue Andorians, pig-like
Tellarites, and the Vulcans, and fun can be had taking a look at
the extras at the back of the scene. Two men lurk behind
Sarek, one with what looks a like a grey, granny bun style wig, on
his head and the other bearded with his dark hair done in Pippi
Longstocking braids. The scene looks like pure distilled Star Trek,
and yet this is the first time we've seen a group of different aliens
together like this.
The
dead Tellarite hanging upside down in the Jefferies tube is another
striking image; and even 45 years later congratulations are due to
whichever extra, or stuntman, endured the discomfort to allow the
shot to be captured. It's also a striking piece of editing by James
D. Ballas, we cut straight from Gav storming out of the reception, to
a stock shot of the Enterprise, to Gav hanging dead in front of the
camera. Less effective is the later editing of the attack on Kirk.
Cutting straight into the middle of the fight between Kirk and the
Orion agent may save precious screen time but it jars very badly.
and is one of the few times when Star Trek's editing becomes
momentarily disorientating and draws the viewer out of the
episode.
Deforest Kelly gets a good joke at the start of the
episode when he asks Spock, “how does that Vulcan salute go?”
After an unsuccessful attempt to duplicate Spock's hand position
(“that hurts worse than the uniform”) he nods when introduced to
Sarek, and then raises his hand slightly before glancing down and
lowering it again.
The episode ends with Spock and Sarek's
relationship apparently patched up. The earlier more frosty state of
affairs presumably answers a question from Amok Time,
one that goes unnoticed among all the Vulcan weirdness on display in that episode. Why didn't Spock's parents attend his wedding
Enterprise
crew deaths:
None, despite the damage done by the attacking ship.
Running total: 35
