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Star Trek - The Original Series, Vol. 11, Episodes 21 & 22: Tomorrow is Yesterday/ The Return of the Archons

Star Trek - The Original Series, Vol. 11, Episodes 21 & 22: Tomorrow is Yesterday/ The Return of the Archons

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Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Yesterday & Return
Review: "Tomorrow Is Yesterday" The Enterprise is thrown back in time to the 20th century. How will they get back to their own time?

"Return of the Archons" A computer is ruling a planet & forcing the people to behave strangely. How will it be stopped?

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Return of great science fiction
Review: Although Tomorrow is Yesterday is an okay episode, it is not one to rave about.It is certainly not one of the original series' best. However, Return of the Archons is one of the best and one of my favourites.Kirk, Spock and McCoy investigate a planet where the inhabitants appear to be in a drug-induced state then rapidly change from walking peacefully and amiably along the streets into violent and looting maniacs that seem to lose all inhibitions. A mob attacks Kirk and crew and they are forced to defend themselves with their phasers. It seems the planet is run by a man named Landru, who advocates peace and tranquility to the extent that you get "absorbed".A kind of brainwash conditioning into thinking only of harmony and serenity.Later it is discovered that Landru is a computor projection;the edict of Landru who died 5,000 years ago has been continued by a computer I just read a review saying the solution to the Landru mystery won't surprise anyone, it sure surprised me. I didn't see that one coming.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Star Trek volume 11 DVD
Review: Aside from the episodes in these DVD's, I look for clarity and things that you can't see on TV. In the return of the archons, the scene where kirk and company is chased by a mob with sticks, the clarity is amazing. I believe that most outdoor scenes on these DVD's are super clear. Tommorow is yesterday has some super clear scenes as well, such as the closeup on the fighter pilot that is chasing the enterprise. You can see all the details of his helmet and straps. Make sure if you get a chance to watch one of these DVD's on a home computer with a 17 inch or larger screen. It will be MUCH better than what can be seen on a TV unless it is a HDTV set. The reason is that a computer DVD drive uses what is called progressive scan, versus interlaced which is used on most DVD Tv players. You can get progressive players for Tv's but they only work well with digital and HDTV Tv's.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: dvd order
Review: Great! Would buy from this seller again, rec'd order in reasonable time.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Traveling through time and space to improve the universe
Review: Kirk, Spock and the Enterprise travel through both time and space to make the universe a better place in the pair of episodes offered upon Volume 11 of the Star Trek DVD series. For the first time the Enterprise goes back in time in "Tomorrow is Yesterday," thrown back while trying to break free of the gravitational pull of a black hole. The Enterprise ends up in the late 1960's (neat coincidence, huh?) over the United States, where a jet fighter is scrambled to check out the giant blip on the radar. Worried about nuclear missiles, Kirk uses the tractor beam to stop the aircraft, which then falls apart. The Enterprise rescues the pilot, Captain John Christopher, who finds everything (including Spock) a little hard to believe. Then Kirk discovers he is between a rock and a hard place: they cannot let Christopher return with his knowledge of the future but the officer has to return because his son, who is not yet been conceived, is going to be a famous space explorer. There are some nice moments in "Tomorrow is Yesterday," having to do with the sudden confrontation of the past and the future, the best of which (Kirk being interrogated by the Military Police) will pop up again in the movie "Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home." I have to admit, I like a time travel episode where the entire fate of the universe does not hang in the balance, as in "The City on the Edge of Forever."

"The Return of the Archons" offers up one of those dystopian societies that the Enterprise stumbled across from time to time. The Enterprise visits Beta III looking for the Archon, a ship that disappeared 100 years ago. The away team discovers a population where all the citizens seem drugged until that evening when they all go crazy. Seeking an explanation from the town's elders, they are told that this is the will of their leader, Landru. A long time ago the planet was ravaged by war and Landru brought an era of peace and tranquility. Before he died he programmed a super computer that has been controlling the lives of the people. Like all computers in the future, this one is doing a horrible job, apparently thinking that by letting the drugged out citizens do a little fighting and looting from time to time will achieve a sense of balance. I am not particularly impressed by either the society or this episode, especially since this is the first of several times that Kirk will use logic to defeat a computer (come on, Spock never even says, "Way to go, Jim," or anything during these encounters). The situation is certain spooky enough (think the end of "6,000,000 Years to Earth"), but the truth behind the mystery is less than satisfactory.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Traveling through time and space to improve the universe
Review: Kirk, Spock and the Enterprise travel through both time and space to make the universe a better place in the pair of episodes offered upon Volume 11 of the Star Trek DVD series. For the first time the Enterprise goes back in time in "Tomorrow is Yesterday," thrown back while trying to break free of the gravitational pull of a black hole. The Enterprise ends up in the late 1960's (neat coincidence, huh?) over the United States, where a jet fighter is scrambled to check out the giant blip on the radar. Worried about nuclear missiles, Kirk uses the tractor beam to stop the aircraft, which then falls apart. The Enterprise rescues the pilot, Captain John Christopher, who finds everything (including Spock) a little hard to believe. Then Kirk discovers he is between a rock and a hard place: they cannot let Christopher return with his knowledge of the future but the officer has to return because his son, who is not yet been conceived, is going to be a famous space explorer. There are some nice moments in "Tomorrow is Yesterday," having to do with the sudden confrontation of the past and the future, the best of which (Kirk being interrogated by the Military Police) will pop up again in the movie "Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home." I have to admit, I like a time travel episode where the entire fate of the universe does not hang in the balance, as in "The City on the Edge of Forever."

"The Return of the Archons" offers up one of those dystopian societies that the Enterprise stumbled across from time to time. The Enterprise visits Beta III looking for the Archon, a ship that disappeared 100 years ago. The away team discovers a population where all the citizens seem drugged until that evening when they all go crazy. Seeking an explanation from the town's elders, they are told that this is the will of their leader, Landru. A long time ago the planet was ravaged by war and Landru brought an era of peace and tranquility. Before he died he programmed a super computer that has been controlling the lives of the people. Like all computers in the future, this one is doing a horrible job, apparently thinking that by letting the drugged out citizens do a little fighting and looting from time to time will achieve a sense of balance. I am not particularly impressed by either the society or this episode, especially since this is the first of several times that Kirk will use logic to defeat a computer (come on, Spock never even says, "Way to go, Jim," or anything during these encounters). The situation is certain spooky enough (think the end of "6,000,000 Years to Earth"), but the truth behind the mystery is less than satisfactory.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: "Interesting is a word and a half for it, captain..."
Review: REVIEWED ITEM: Star Trek ® Original Series DVD Volume : Tomorrow is Yesterday © / The Return of the Archons ©

TOMORROW IS YESTERDAY © PRELIMINARY BRIEFS:

Moral, Ethical, and/or Philosophical Subject(s) Driven Into The Ground: the consequences of messin' 'round with the space-time continuum

Historical Milestone: Star Trek's first full-fledged time-travel episode

Notable Gaffe / Special De-fect: Be on the lookout for a scene where Spock's poppin' a communications earpiece into his noggin with his back facing the camera. If you take a good look at his ears, you can see the lack of craftsmanship in the particular pair he was wearing that day! It was definitely an off-day for the makeup department'

Expendable Enterprise Crewmember ('Red Shirt') Confirmed Casualty List: 1 Incapacitated

REVIEW/COMMENTARY: Ah, nothin' like a good time-travel eppie of Star Trek that tries to clear things up about the whole space-time thingy yet leaves you even more confused than ever before! For example, if the abducted Air Force pilot's progeny is going to make so significant a contribution to Earth's future that if he hadn't existed the Federation may not have ever existed, it would... umm... well, see what I mean? It's high time for me to dispense with the temporal mechanics and head into the fun parts of this eppie...

In one of the most unbelievably silly fights ever filmed for network TV, Kirk manages to fend off three US Air Force officers in a scene more reminiscent of the Keystone Kops than Bruce Lee! Putting into consideration the high-quality (*snicker*) choreography of Kirk's previous Star Trek fisticuffs, it's not like it was any big surprise. Speaking of choreograohy, Tomorrow is Yesterday© is also one of the series' best showcases of the bridge crew's amazing ability to lean in unison with the lurching ship! Heck, if synchronized leaning were an Olympic sport, all the US would do is send out the original Trek cast to compete! They'd win the gold by an even greater margin than the first couple of US Olympic Basketball Dream Teams did!

THE RETURN OF THE ARCHONS © PRELIMINARY BRIEFS:

Moral, Ethical, and/or Philosophical Subject(s) Driven Into The Ground: The downside of cultural stagnation leading to a soulless society and other excuses for Kirk to ignore Starfleet's Prime Directive

Historical Milestone: Star Trek's first significant 'Kirk-versus-machine' episode

Expendable Enterprise Crewmember ('Red Shirt') Confirmed Casualty List: 2 'absorbed', subsequently recovered

REVIEW/COMMENTARY: Seen by many as Gene Roddenberry's commentary about the dangers of conformity in a society, 'Archons' is notable for being the first time Kirk saves the day by talking a computer to 'death'. In this instance, the computer is Landru, a machine that rules and guides a society of seemingly content and happy, yet soulless beings. One particular moment in this episode that really strikes me is the Festival, where the planet's citizenry go berserk and start a riot, complete with people wiggin' out, beatin' up on each other, and storefront windows gettin' smashed! It was likely a disquieting scene to behold for this episode's first viewing audience, what with the Watts riots having occurred a mere two years prior.

Keeping with classic Star Trek's tradition of Kirk interpreting the Prime Directive in a way that suits his own beliefs, Jimbo convinces Landru that it is performing an evil deed by allowing the society that it leads to stagnate. And as one might expect, the master computer eventually self-destructs in a cloud of smoke after the good captain's little soliloquy about how a society needs challenges to overcome and other pro-organic-being rhetoric overloads the machine's logic circuits. Now if I only I could do to the computers of people who keep spamming my e-mail inbox what Jimmers did to Landru, I'd have one less frustration in the world to deal with...

...'Late

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: "Interesting is a word and a half for it, captain..."
Review: REVIEWED ITEM: Star Trek ® Original Series DVD Volume : Tomorrow is Yesterday © / The Return of the Archons ©

TOMORROW IS YESTERDAY © PRELIMINARY BRIEFS:

Moral, Ethical, and/or Philosophical Subject(s) Driven Into The Ground: the consequences of messin' 'round with the space-time continuum

Historical Milestone: Star Trek's first full-fledged time-travel episode

Notable Gaffe / Special De-fect: Be on the lookout for a scene where Spock's poppin' a communications earpiece into his noggin with his back facing the camera. If you take a good look at his ears, you can see the lack of craftsmanship in the particular pair he was wearing that day! It was definitely an off-day for the makeup department'

Expendable Enterprise Crewmember ('Red Shirt') Confirmed Casualty List: 1 Incapacitated

REVIEW/COMMENTARY: Ah, nothin' like a good time-travel eppie of Star Trek that tries to clear things up about the whole space-time thingy yet leaves you even more confused than ever before! For example, if the abducted Air Force pilot's progeny is going to make so significant a contribution to Earth's future that if he hadn't existed the Federation may not have ever existed, it would... umm... well, see what I mean? It's high time for me to dispense with the temporal mechanics and head into the fun parts of this eppie...

In one of the most unbelievably silly fights ever filmed for network TV, Kirk manages to fend off three US Air Force officers in a scene more reminiscent of the Keystone Kops than Bruce Lee! Putting into consideration the high-quality (*snicker*) choreography of Kirk's previous Star Trek fisticuffs, it's not like it was any big surprise. Speaking of choreograohy, Tomorrow is Yesterday© is also one of the series' best showcases of the bridge crew's amazing ability to lean in unison with the lurching ship! Heck, if synchronized leaning were an Olympic sport, all the US would do is send out the original Trek cast to compete! They'd win the gold by an even greater margin than the first couple of US Olympic Basketball Dream Teams did!

THE RETURN OF THE ARCHONS © PRELIMINARY BRIEFS:

Moral, Ethical, and/or Philosophical Subject(s) Driven Into The Ground: The downside of cultural stagnation leading to a soulless society and other excuses for Kirk to ignore Starfleet's Prime Directive

Historical Milestone: Star Trek's first significant 'Kirk-versus-machine' episode

Expendable Enterprise Crewmember ('Red Shirt') Confirmed Casualty List: 2 'absorbed', subsequently recovered

REVIEW/COMMENTARY: Seen by many as Gene Roddenberry's commentary about the dangers of conformity in a society, 'Archons' is notable for being the first time Kirk saves the day by talking a computer to 'death'. In this instance, the computer is Landru, a machine that rules and guides a society of seemingly content and happy, yet soulless beings. One particular moment in this episode that really strikes me is the Festival, where the planet's citizenry go berserk and start a riot, complete with people wiggin' out, beatin' up on each other, and storefront windows gettin' smashed! It was likely a disquieting scene to behold for this episode's first viewing audience, what with the Watts riots having occurred a mere two years prior.

Keeping with classic Star Trek's tradition of Kirk interpreting the Prime Directive in a way that suits his own beliefs, Jimbo convinces Landru that it is performing an evil deed by allowing the society that it leads to stagnate. And as one might expect, the master computer eventually self-destructs in a cloud of smoke after the good captain's little soliloquy about how a society needs challenges to overcome and other pro-organic-being rhetoric overloads the machine's logic circuits. Now if I only I could do to the computers of people who keep spamming my e-mail inbox what Jimmers did to Landru, I'd have one less frustration in the world to deal with...

...'Late

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Star Trek volume 11 DVD
Review: The two episodes on this DVD are very good. The standout is Return of the Archons. While it may look cheesy and cheap, it has a very good story. Also, the humor in this episode and Tomorrow is Yesterday are among the best moments in the entire series. This is a must have CD.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: 2 Solid Episodes
Review: The two episodes on this DVD are very good. The standout is Return of the Archons. While it may look cheesy and cheap, it has a very good story. Also, the humor in this episode and Tomorrow is Yesterday are among the best moments in the entire series. This is a must have CD.


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