Title :
The Lorelei Signal
Series :
Rating :
Overall Ep :
4
First Aired :
29 Sep 1973
Stardate :
5483.7
Director :
Year :
Writers :
Season Ep :
YATI :
When Chapel beams down to Taurus II, she was wearing a red uniform.
Factoid :
The planet Taurus II is from the TOS episode 'The Galileo Seven' - it's the planet the shuttle crashed on.
My year for this episode is estimated from the Stardate; it is one of a group of TAS episodes set between 'For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky' and 'Is There in Truth no Beauty?'
This episode is a nominee for the DITL "
Worst of Trek" award.
Plotline
The Enterprise investigates an uncharted sector where both Federation and Klingon vessels have been reported missing every 27 years. Mysterious signals from the Taurean system, cause the male crew to have hallucinations about beautiful women. Kirk, Spock, and McCoy beam down to the source of the signals and find a society composed entirely of beautiful women; the officers are quickly taken prisoner, forcing Uhura to take command of the Enterprise and lead an all-female landing party to rescue her comrades.
Analysis
I don't really like this one on a couple of fronts. First, the idea of having a threat which only affects the men of the ship is obviously just a gimmick intended to put Uhura and the ladies in charge, something which seems out of place given that the Federation is a society where gender bias is supposedly a thing of the past. Having put Uhura in charge, the episode then goes a bit over the top in having her use force to free her shipmates - Kirk would try to reason these things out and compromise, only reverting to raw firepower as a last resort. Still, despite these flaws this is a reasonably entertaining episode.
Special Edition
