The role of duality and what it means to be human have always been staples of science-fiction. For The Enemy Within, legendary writer Richard Matheson was brought in to write the script. As the writer of tales such as I Am Legend, The Shrinking Man, and TV work such as various Twilight Zone episodes, he had the experience in the field to pull off more than just an average episode. For his story he expanded the Jekyll & Hyde concept to examine just what it is that drives us as people, both good and evil.
Mudd’s Women would explore another side of what makes us who we are, the simple matter of self-acceptance. This was a relevant issue then and one that has become even more heightened over the years, with plastic surgery being more commonplace, and the media bombarding us with images of physically “perfect” people all the time. This was an episode that did what Star Trek has always done best: tell a story that has a message.
Star Trek is always at its best when it tells morality tales, even if on the surface it appears that the stories are little more than adventures set in a far-removed future. However, as fans scratched beyond that thin veneer they saw Trek as being more than it first appeared. It soon became known amongst fans as space-opera, true drama that fooled the unsuspecting into thinking it was little more than just another blip on the pop culture radar.
The Enemy Within – Summary: Returning from a geological survey of Alpha 177 to the Enterprise, Captain Kirk stumbles off the transporter pad and is assisted out by a worried Scotty. No sooner have they left than an evil duplicate of Kirk arrives, who makes his way to sickbay where he angrily takes a bottle of Saurian brandy. When beaming an alien dog aboard, Scotty receives two, one well-behaved and a more vicious duplicate. He realises that the effects of beaming a person aboard would result in the same thing happening and so the decision is made to strand the landing party on the planet in sub-zero temperatures until the problem can be solved.
In the meantime, a drunken “evil” Kirk physically assaults Yeoman Rand, but his attempt is foiled and he goes on the run. The “good” Kirk is initially blamed, but it quickly becomes apparent what has happened. However, “good” Kirk is slow to make decisions in capturing his alter-ego. They engage in a cat-and-mouse chase around the ship, but once the “evil” Kirk is captured Spock and McCoy realise that neither is the “real” Kirk. By being split apart, neither Kirk can function properly, and they must be recombined in order to save the lives of both.
With the landing party beginning to freeze to death, Spock and Scotty struggle to repair the transporter by connecting it to the impulse drive. They experiment the recombination process on the alien dogs, which succeeds in joining them but the dog dies. The “good” Kirk releases his evil self, who overpowers him and makes a last stand on the bridge before collapsing. Spock finally transports the two of them and succeeds in recombining them, with the “real” Kirk suddenly back in command and making effective decisions to rescue the stranded crew. Back on the bridge, Kirk thanks Spock from both sides of his persona, while Yeoman Rand strangely misses the loss of a more impulsive Kirk.
Mudd’s Womenn – Summary: The Enterprise pursues a cargo ship that is attempting to escape in an asteroid field. The crew and cargo are beamed aboard shortly before the cargo ship explodes, and the rescue destroys all but one of the Enterprise’s lithium circuits. The captain of the cargo ship identifies himself as Leo Walsh, and his “cargo” is three beautiful women who are being delivered as mail-order brides for some settlers on Ophiuchus III. The women have an unnerving effect on the men of the Enterprise, but Kirk holds a hearing where he determines that “Leo Walsh” is really Harry Mudd, a known felon. Meanwhile, Bones picks up strange reading on his medical scanner that makes him suspect there’s more to the women than there appears.
The failure of the final lithium crystal is a bigger concern though, and Spock suggests that they acquire more on Rigel XII. Mudd steals a communicator and cuts a deal with the miners of Rigel XII to exchange the mail-order brides for lithium crystals. While Kirk refuses the deal, the safety of the now-helpless Enterprise forces him to beam Mudd and the women to the surface. However, one of the women, Eve, despises being treated as a sex-object and runs away from her potential husband Childress into a dust storm. Kirk uses the ship’s sensors to locate her, while she has been saved by Childless, who learns that Mudd has been giving the women the Venus drug which increases their beauty and sex appeal.
Childress is furious at the deception. Kirk gives Eve a placebo which increases her self-confidence although she remains as she plain as she was before. Relying solely on her intelligence and personality, she still impresses Childress and wins him over, and Kirk explains that the measure of a person is what’s inside them. Mudd’s women marry the miners and the miners are happy with the outcome. In exchange they gladly give Kirk the desperately-needed lithium, and Harry Mudd is taken away by Kirk to be handed over to the correct authorities, with Kirk volunteering to be a character witness. Back on the bridge, Spock expresses his relief that the emotionally arousing situation has returned to normal…
At first glance, both of these episodes seem incredibly flimsy. The concept of “good” and “evil” Kirks squaring off almost sounds like a weak joke, while beautiful mail-order brides entrancing the male crew of the Enterprise seems like a cheap effort at exploitation. Once you get past that, you realise that they’re both very smart stories.
The Enemy Within is about coming to terms with the impulses that drive us. Within each of us is the capacity for both good and evil, and they need to exist together in order for us to survive. William Shatner turns in a stunning performance as all versions of Kirk, and does a wonderful job convincing us of the menace of “evil” Kirk and indecisiveness of the “good” Kirk. The rest of the cast do a great job too, and while Sulu’s alien dog may give us a chuckle early on, the tension of the situation builds nicely.
Mudd’s Women is more subversive. The soundtrack plays sexy music whenever the women walk by, and they are attractive. That they’re “cargo” is misleading too; the want to go and get married of their own free will. The men’s reaction to them may seem a little exaggerated, even causing Spock to smile, but since they’re being affected by the Venus drug it’s perfectly understandable. When we see the women as they are we’re initially shocked and maybe even repulsed. This was intentional, and makes us question our own beliefs of what is beautiful just as the miners and the Enterprise crew have to question theirs. We all judge by appearance first, it’s a sad truth we have to accept. Thankfully, Eve and Kirk’s statements at the end are as true today as they were then.
