LogFAQs > #969084713

Episode 2: Bem

So that's what Bem is. I don't think I'm a fan. Something about this episode just doesn't sit right with me.

Kirk and Spock have returned to their double act that sustained a lot of otherwise average episodes. Some decent self aware humour in this. I was kind of surprised that McCoy made no appearance whatsoever.

Uhura being given more to do is still wonderful. Holding command and successfully arguing with Scotty is just the cherry on top.

Bem seems like a slightly confused, but nonetheless interesting concept. His odd behaviour and ability to separate and float his body parts about like the Genie gives him a trickster mentor vibe. I was expecting him to actually be working with the intelligence. Some interesting ideas with him being a colony creature that also has a sort of single identity. Disunity is almost more harrowing than what a more mundane suicide would be like. His speech pattern foreshadows the colony twist, but it wore out its welcome pretty quick. The fact that he isn't in cahoots with the intelligence hurts his character for me, since it makes his antics seem like he's just being a git for a very arbitrary purpose. Charging into the village goes from an audacious display of showing how directly communicating with another culture is a better way to actually understand them, to a moment of needless stupidity. Hurts the theme the episode's going for, as well, I think. Ultimately, just annoying. Decent design, though.

The Intelligence is a mostly fantastic character that almost saves this episode alone. Nichols, similar to her new turn as Uhura, gives her a appropriate amount of presence for a planetary consciousness. Calling out the problematic nature of the federation's work on the planet is great and demonstrating a gentle, but forceful wisdom makes her one of the better godlike beings we've seen so far. Even her first "appearance", of just asserting her existence and speaking forcefully, but calmly, is absolutely brilliant and without a doubt the best moment of this episode.

The big caveat, of course, ties into the themes that the episode is trying (and failing, in my opinion), to communicate. The prime directive has a lot of potential to be a patronising call to snobbery and arrogance over other cultures and Spock's comments about primitivism and similar nonsense don't help. The explicit need to classify and test other peoples, as though they're samples in a petri dish, is appallingly dehumanising, but aside from that, it's mirrored in what Bem's doing. He's observing and testing the federation in an identical manner. He even had avoidant at best (missing six missions) and inexplicable at worst behaviour. Not too far from how a real anthropologist's behaviour would seem to whichever culture they were hassling. Add to this, his trickster behaviour, casual manner when captured and the frequent mentions of a growing sensory phenomenon and we could have had the animated Errand of Mercy, where the primitives are secretly advanced (though advancing isnt strictly necessary for the next part) and ultimately hold the dodgy values of Kirk, the federation and, potentially, the audience themselves, to account.

Instead, Bem is a genuine fool who had to learn his lesson in the end. (Quite what the lesson is escapes me, since this whole thing is so confused). Even the intelligence doesn't escape unscathed. She could've been a natural part of the ecosystem/culture, like Vaal if he were in a real episode and not a complete atrocity. Having Bem work alongside her would then only enhance the impact. But, unfortunately, Kirk and Spock ruin it during the final lines when they suggest that she's as much a scientist running a lab as they were trying to be. So, I'm left confused as to whether the episode thinks that treating people as an experiment is acceptable or not. What I am certain about, though, is that, despite invoking the prime directive, the episode doesn't care about its native people at all. The only speaking roles go to the supposedly "advanced".

It's not even particularly poorly made, it's just very confused.

The Practical Joker, next.