The Good: Good general story, Acting, Character development
The Bad: Very shaky premise for character interactions
The Basics: A time travel episode that is almost too baffling to work ultimately creates the last good episode of the classic Star Trek with good performances and character work with "All Our Yesterdays."
One of the oddest mass-culture phenomenon of the last century had to be Star Trek. Inarguably a television classic, Star Trek never found a massive market during first run, so it was canceled, went into syndication and a wider audience began to witness the show and become attached to the adventures of the U.S.S. Enterprise and its crew. It spawned three spin-offs, one rip-off, six movies, a multi-billion dollar collectibles industry, inspired the career paths of millions worldwide, is handed down to children as part of family events and is a legitimate, established subculture of U.S. culture that binds people of all different types. Star Trek is a huge phenomenon. Yet, most people who have watched episodes can't name a single episode, can barely describe what happened in one, and now many disassociate themselves from their former love. I mention this in my review of "All Our Yesterdays" because as the series wound down (this was the penultimate episode of the series), the idea that Star Trek is a phenomenon is worth mentioning and this is the final decent episode (the third season was arguably short on those!) and often those who see this particular episode could not describe it a week later, even if their life depended on it.
The U.S.S. Enterprise arrives at the planet Sarpedion, whose star is about to go supernova. Anticipating this stellar event as a great tragedy, because of the population of the planet, Captain Kirk, Spock and Dr. McCoy are astounded to find the planet almost completely devoid of lifeforms. They beam down to the planet to find Mr. Atoz, the librarian of a unique library, eager to get them evacuated. Atoz becomes agitated and uses a device to send Captain Kirk back to the planet's Medieval times and Spock and McCoy are teleported back to the planet's last ice age. As Spock and McCoy fight for survival in the harsh elements, Kirk attempts to determine what happened and return to his proper time before it is too late.
The concept of the episode is clever; the people of Sarpedion did not evacuate the planet in the traditional sense. Instead, they have their cells altered and they are shipped back in time and thus abandon their world to its destruction in the present while they create their own past. Outside all of the potential problems of what that would do to the planet's evolution and normal timeline, the idea is clever and it's worth watching to reward that clever idea.
Moreover, Kirk's struggle is a decent one. Desperate to return to the present, Kirk finds himself able to communicate with the library, but because of the time he is trapped in, he is captured and accused of witchcraft. Ouch! The episode addresses this in a way that is perfectly credible given the circumstances; one of the refugees from the future figures out who he is and aids him.
What is hard to buy is the stability of the time portal. The library's device makes sense when it is activated, but the method by which Kirk and Spock communicate through it is shaky at best. The library in the future seems to create a stable hole (which is invisible) in time that anyone who runs into would seemingly be transported back to the library through. Such things confound the viewer when put in context; Kirk finds the portal at a wall - how could the wall be built with the time portal there? After all, wouldn't the bricks just fall through it? Or better yet, while assembling the wall (because the time portal exists from the future back at least until the ice age) wouldn't a while bunch of Medieval construction workers find themselves in a library in the future? Eh, these are all details, but the point is, the method by which Kirk and company travel to the past makes sense, but the method by which they are expected to return is shoddy and distracting to the episode.
More distracting is what happens to Spock. Spock, here in the second to last episode, finally gets some! Yes, Spock and McCoy are rescued from the elements by a pretty hot cavewoman named Zarabeth (played by Mariette Hartley!). Spock makes love with her, while McCoy is passed out recuperating in the next room of the cave, and eats a meal of meat with her. Both of these things are very much against the character of Spock. The excuse the episode gives the viewer: it's because he's back in time and that's how Vulcan's acted back then. Presumably, by traveling into the past in this method, Spock simply tuned into the brainwaves of the Vulcans hundred of lightyears away and was overcome by them.
Yeah, it's that shaky.
What isn't shaky is the response from Dr. McCoy. McCoy's very human response to this problem involves anger, illogic and everything one associates with McCoy, save that in this instance, he's right. McCoy is brilliantly played by DeForest Kelly, who exhibits a temper that is characteristic for the character, not so for the man. Almost no one argues as passionately as Kelly and this is one of the performances that remind the viewer that part of what made the characters was the actors.
Similarly, Leonard Nimoy and William Shatner give good performances throughout the episode. Shatner makes Kirk credible in the rate at which he adapts to his circumstances, Nimoy acts as feral as possible to sell us on the idea that Spock no longer is in his right mind. The acting and basic plot sell the episode.
"All Our Yesterdays" is a true original from Star Trek, so much so that none of the episodes of the spin-offs ever truly (or effectively) pulled off a recreation of it. It stands alone and that makes it worthwhile.
[Knowing that VHS is essentially a dead medium, it's worth looking into Star Trek - The Complete Third Season on DVD, which is also a better economical choice than buying the VHS. Read my review of the third and final season by clicking here!
Thanks!]
6/10
For other Star Trek episode and movie reviews, please check out my index page by clicking here!
© 2010, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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