Writer: Norman Spinrad
Director: Marc Daniels
Producer: Gene L. Coon
When I think of the most ambitious episodes of Star Trek, it's hard to think of one that perhaps bit off more than it can chew than this one. "The Doomsday Machine" could easily have been the basis for a whole Star Trek movie, and yet here it is as part of the budget conscious second season.
It's a big story. A massive autonomous robotic device, a doomsday machine if you will, is tearing through solar systems devouring planets. It's basically Star Trek's Galactus, or Unicron. Spock ascertains that it emerged from outside our galaxy, and Kirk surmises it must have been constructed as an ultimate weapon by some now destroyed society, and is now left to its own devices.
The starship Constellation ran into this thing, and when it was badly damaged it's commanding officer, Commodore Matt Decker, beamed his crew down to a nearby planet to save them. A planet then promptly destroyed by the doomsday machine. Oops. Now struck with a massive case of survivor's guilt and PTSD, Decker is beamed over to the Enterprise with McCoy, while Kirk and Scotty attempt to restore power to the Constellation.
That's when Spock determines that the next target will be the highly populated Rigel system, and Decker decides fuck it and pulls rank to take command of the Enterprise and launch an offensive against the weapon, despite Spock telling him that it's hull is too strong to be damaged by phasers and it's own weaponry will ultimately destroy the ship.
Ultimately, Spock manages to get Decker relieved from command due to psychological imbalance, but the Commodore takes a shuttle and rams it down the machine's maw in a suicide run. It does nothing to stop it, but it does do enough damage for Kirk to realize that ramming the Constellation into the machine may stop it.
While Decker is in command, the episode presents our first look (of many) at an unhinged Starfleet officer, the dangers of a captain losing objectivity and pursuing vengeance instead of the safety of his ship. In other words, it's the first of many, many times that Star Trek will riff on Moby-Dick. The remainder of the episode after his death is a race against time to destroy this thing, with damage to the Enterprise meaning that beaming Kirk back to the ship before the Constellation explodes isn't a sure thing.
It's an exciting hour, with multiple starships, a big galactic threat to intelligent life, and lots of space effects shots. Writer Norman Spinrad was apparently unhappy with the design of the planet killer, but I've always liked it since I was a kid for it's pure uniqueness. It's a very big episode and the multitude of effects must have cost a bundle.
If the show has a flaw, it's that William Windom is a *touch* over the top in his portrayal of Matt Decker's PTSD. He's great when Decker's taken command and lording it over everyone, but his grief and madness are a bit overplayed. And I'm saying that on a scale that takes William Shatner into account.
Rating: 3.5 out of 4
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