Summoned by an urgent request for medical help, the Enterprise crew finds a group of aliens who supposedly model their society on the teachings of Plato. Their leader is suffering massive infection and is close to death.
Act One
The crew discovers the Platonians' powerful psychokinetic abilities, as the man's delirium has violent effects on his surroundings. Another Platonian trait is extreme longevity, as well as frail physical immunity seemingly caused by their emphasis on mental prowess. This is what caused their powerful ruler to be so vulnerable to what should have been a minor injury.
When in the Sahndara system, the inhabitants initiated a eugenics program. "Plato's Stepchildren" escaped to Earth in the time of the ancient Greek philosopher Plato when their star, Sahndara, went supernova. They established a republic based on the eponymous work, where 38 inhabitants live a life of quiet contemplation and self-reliance.
Parmen insists that McCoy stay with him and Philana
A simple cut in the leg has developed an unknown infection. Dr.McCoy's treatment of Parmen is effective, and the crew attempts to leave the planet. However, the Enterprise is frozen; there are no transporters, navigation, or subspace communication with Starfleet. CaptainKirk barges into Parmen's chamber, and Parmen strips Kirk of his weapon and tell him that guests must recognize his supremacy. In an allusion to the Greek ideal of guest-friend, Kirk retorts: "Guest? You don't know the meaning of the word. Guests are not treated like common prisoners." Parmen uses his psychokinetic powers to force Kirk to slap himself in the face repeatedly.
Act Two
Kirk, Spock, and McCoy are in their room next, trying to contact the Enterprise to no avail. The Platonians summon them and seem grateful for McCoy's help. They provide the landing party with gifts: the shield of Pericles goes to Kirk, a kithara to Spock, and a collection of Greek cures written by Hippocrates for McCoy. Parmen appeals for Kirk's forgiveness. He says he will release the ship, but he wants McCoy to remain on the planet.
McCoy refuses, and Parmen says he will not be refused. Kirk says that he cannot consider himself a descendant of Plato. Spock points out, "Plato wanted truth and beauty and above all, justice." Parmen says that their society is the most democratic ever – unlike the Federation, which uses weapons to enforce justice, the Platonians use the power of the mind. He says he wants to persuade Kirk and Spock to leave peacefully so as not to upset McCoy.
Parmen uses his mental powers to intimidate and humiliate Captain Kirk and Spock into compliance. First, they sing a song and dance a jig. Kirk tells McCoy that he is not going to let him stay behind, and Parmen makes Kirk recite some lines which are from William Shakespeare's Sonnet LVII: "Being your slave what should I do but tend | Upon the hours, and times of your desire? | I have no precious time at all to spend; | Nor service[s] to do, till you ...". Parmen makes Spock dance some more, and then forces him to laugh and cry, torturing his Vulcan psychology by forcing emotion out of him.
Act Three
McCoy decides that he will volunteer to stay, but Kirk refuses, pointing out that once they are gone they will be destroyed. Alexander speaks up, saying that Kirk is right. He gives a speech that says he used to think that it was his own fault that he did not have the same powers, and that he was lucky that the Platonians kept him alive and around. But now, after the crew stood up to them and showed them for what they are, he knows it's them.
Spock questions Alexander about the powers, and learns that the power grew shortly after the Platonians used up their food stores and started eating local food. McCoy scans Alexander's blood and finds that Parmen has more kironide, which is broken down by the pituitary gland. McCoy synthesizes the kironide and injects himself, Kirk and Spock – at double Parmen's strength. Kirk suggests that Alexander get a dose, take Parmen's place, and rule the planet, but Alexander refuses: "You think that's what I want? Become one of them? Become my own enemy? Just lie around like a big blob of nothing and have things done for me? I want to run around for myself. If I am going to laugh or cry, I want to do it for myself. You can keep your precious power. All I ask is one thing: if you do make it out of here, take me with you."
The conversation is interrupted when the Platonians force Lt. Uhura and Nurse Christine Chapel to beam down as Kirk, Spock and McCoy look on in bewilderment as the women, unable to speak, walk away and are forced against their will to prepare for the evening's festivitites.
Act Four
Later that night, Uhura and Chapel step out into the main hall, both dressed in fabulous Greek dresses as Kirk and Spock join them, clad in short Greek tunics and laurel leaf crowns on their heads. Kirk asks Spock to try to lift some plates of food, but the powers have not kicked in yet. Kirk, Spock, Uhura, and Chapel are led to a stage. Parmen would like to welcome McCoy, but he has to convince McCoy to change his mind first. He makes Spock sing what he calls "a serenade from the laughing spaceman" to Uhura and Chapel.
Then, the quartet split into two pairs: Uhura and Kirk, and Chapel and Spock. Chapel and Spock are forced to kiss despite their protests; Chapel confesses that she has wanted to be close to Spock for so long but now she wants to "crawl away and die". Uhura likewise confesses to Kirk that she was so often calmed by Kirk when she was frightened on the bridge. The two couples struggle in vain to avoid kissing, but kiss anyway.
After the kisses, Parmen compels Kirk to crack a bullwhip at Uhura and Spock to brandish a hot poker at Chapel. While Parmen is distracted controlling the four officers, Alexander attempts to sneak up on him with a knife. Parmen shifts his focus to trying to make Alexander turn the knife on himself. Meanwhile, Kirk begins to feel his telekinetic power building, and laughs once he prevents Alexander from hurting himself. Parmen cannot believe that Kirk has telekinetic abilities, and tries to test them. He sends Alexander to threaten Kirk with the knife, but again the captain turns the tables on the Platonian. For a brief time, the two minds fight for control of Alexander. Kirk's power is proven the greater, but ultimately they both release him. Alexander begins to use his free will to attack Parmen, but Kirk stops him, asking simply, "Do you want to be like him?" Alexander struggles with his conscience, but finally drops the knife, heaping contempt onto his former leader instead. Parmen sees that Kirk has spared his life, and appears repentant. He promises that he will be benevolent towards future visits by Starfleet. Spock and Kirk are dubious of the reform, and so stress that any returning visitors can easily be dosed with kironide as well. Parmen appears to acquiesce to this truth, and Kirk seems satisfied that the "Platonian problem" has been solved.
Kirk calls Scotty for transport, saying that he has "a little surprise" for the chief engineer. Kirk intends to make good on his earlier promise to remove Alexander from Platonius.
Log Entries
"Captain's log, stardate 5784.2. We are responding to desperate distress calls from an unknown planet. My science officer, Mr. Spock, is unable to account for this, since he reported no signs of life on the planet. It is rich in kironide deposits, a very rare and long-lasting source of great power."
"Captain's log, stardate 5784.3. Dr. McCoy is endeavoring to treat the leader of a strange group of people. When their planet novaed, millennia ago, they transported themselves to Earth during the time of Socrates and Plato. After the death of the Greek civilization they idolized, they came to this planet and created for themselves a utopia patterned after it."
Memorable quotes
"Alexander, where I come from, size, shape or color makes no difference."
"Don't stop me! Let me finish him off!"
"Do you want to be like him?"
- Alexander and Kirk, as Alexander points a knife at Parmen
"Despite your brains, you're the most contemptible things that ever lived in this universe. "
- Alexander, scolding Parmen
"To us, killing is murder. Even for revenge."
- Kirk to Parmen, on why he was spared
"Uncontrolled, power will turn even saints into savages. And we can all be counted upon to live down to our lowest impulses."
- Parmen to Kirk, before the landing party departs
Background Information
This episode has long been famous for featuring "the first interracial kiss on American network television".
The first interracial kiss on US television?
To be more precise, it was "the first kiss between a fictional white male and a fictional black female to premiere on American network television", as Kirk would kiss an Asian-American actress, France Nuyen, in a previous episode: "Elaan of Troyius". Almost a year earlier (11 December1967), NBC broadcast an Emmy Award-winning musical-variety special entitled Movin' With Nancy, during which singers Nancy Sinatra and Sammy Davis, Jr. greeted each other with a kiss. [1]Desilu's flagship show, I Love Lucy, had years previously broken the barrier on Hispanic/Caucasian kissing. Also, The Little Rascals had some "innocent" kisses between its child stars, but these shorts had previously premiered in cinemas under the title Our Gang.
There is some dispute about whether the kiss actually occurred. According to the photo at left, it appears that the actors' lips are touching. However, both Shatner and Nichols claim in Star Trek Memories that NBC exerted pressure to forbid lip contact, and to use a clever camera technique to conceal the "separation". If you look closely at the image, you can tell that the actors' lips are not touching, the angle only makes it look like they might be slightly touching.
According to Nichelle Nichols, in the early script, it was supposed to be Spock that kissed Uhura, but William Shatner had it changed, saying "If anyone's gonna get to kiss Nichelle, it's going to be me, I mean, Captain Kirk!" (40 years later, Spock and Uhura would freely kiss multiple times - much to Kirk's surprise - in Star Trek.) Nichols also said that they got more mail on that episode than any other episode in the history of the series and none of it, surprisingly, was negative. Nichols recalled a letter that Gene Roddenberry showed her. It was from a man in the American South, and he said "I am against the mixing of the races, but anytime a red-blooded American boy like Captain Kirk gets his arms around a gal like Lt. Uhura, he ain't gonna fight it!"
Also according to Nichols, NBC was afraid of the kiss because some stations in the South could decide not to air the episode because of it. Finally, an agreement was made: to film two versions of the scene - one where Kirk and Uhura kissed, and one where they did not. They filmed the first version (with the kiss) successfully, then Shatner and she deliberately flubbed every take of the latter, making it unsuitable, and having the kiss intact. Nichols writes: "The next day they screened the dailies, and although I rarely attended them, I couldn't miss this one. Everyone watched as Kirk and Uhura kissed and kissed and kissed. And I'd like to set the record straight: Although Kirk and Uhura fought it, they did kiss in every single scene. When the non-kissing scene came on, everyone in the room cracked up. The last shot, which looked okay on the set, actually had Bill wildly crossing his eyes. It was so corny and just plain bad it was unusable. The only alternative was to cut out the scene altogether, but that was impossible to do without ruining the entire episode. Finally, the guys in charge relented: "To hell with it. Let's go with the kiss." I guess they figured we were going to be cancelled in a few months anyway. And so the kiss stayed." (Beyond Uhura: Star Trek and Other Memories)
After being absent from the second season because of a dispute with Gene Roddenberry, Alexander Courage returned to compose the music for this episode, his last score for Star Trek. This episode was also the last episode to have an original score, although new songs for "The Way to Eden" and a Bramhs paraphrase for "Requiem for Methuselah" were composed.
Spock sings "Maiden Wine", composed by Leonard Nimoy, to Uhura and Chapel
The story outline was originally titled "The Sons of Socrates" and submitted 13 June1968. [2] The episode was filmed early to mid-September.
The plot is similar in many ways to the 1952 science fiction story Telek by Jack Vance; for instance, both feature a mental fight for control of a knife.
The episode pioneers the use of psychokinetic energy to strangle Alexander, almost a decade before Darth Vader's famous "Force Choke".
This episode was not shown until 22 December1993 in the United Kingdom with the BBC skipping it due to 'sadistic' elements in the plot. (The same fate befell "The Empath" and "Whom Gods Destroy" and a decision was also taken to not repeat "Miri" in a "family" timeslot for similar reasons.) Assumptions that "Plato's Stepchildren" was excluded because the Kirk/Uhura kiss would have been 'controversial' are erroneous. In fact, British television had featured its first 'interracial' kiss several years before US TV; the massively popular prime time soap opera Emergency Ward 10 depicting a long-term "interracial" relationship between two major characters throughout 1964 without inciting controversy in the UK (although the producers had expected that it would).
Spock's observation that Plato desired justice above all is quite correct. In "The Republic," the philosopher envisioned justice as the highest ideal to which any state could aspire, achieved through the harmonious interplay of wisdom, courage, and temperance.
Leonard Nimoy composed "Maiden Wine," the song that he performs in this episode.
Filmed in early and mid-September 1968. First day was filmed on 9 September1968, a Monday, on Gower Stage 9 and 10. It was the first day of shooting of a six day shooting schedule.
The remastered version of "Plato's Stepchildren" aired in many North American markets during the weekend of 16 June2007. Very few new effects were required. Like all other remastered episodes, the physical model of Enterprise has been wholly replaced by a CGI model throughout the episode. Similarly, Enterprise is universally shot at different – and typically closer – angles than in the original.
The most dramatic new effect is that of the planet Platonius. It has changed from its original, Mars-like appearance to one that greatly resembles Earth.
Dr. McCoy's tricorder insert also received a touch-up. Its display was transformed from a bar graph that approximated sickbay displays to an integrated line chart. The benefit of the changed effect is that the display now more easily reads as a true comparison of the blood of Alexander and Parmen, along with (ostensibly) Human norms.
In addition, the digital restoration of non-SFX shots has resulted in an overall brightening of color that is perhaps more profound in this abstractly-designed episode than in others.
The original Platonius
...and its remastered counterpart
McCoy's original tricorder scan
... and the animated graphical comparison of the remastered version
