Podcast Enterprise: S2E01 The Amok time

Space, the final frontier. These are the podcasts of the Podcast Enterprise. Its only mission: to explore story structures, to analyze our favorite characters and plotlines, to boldly talk what everyone has seen before

We will analyze all episodes of Star Trek: The Original Series or TOS for short using the following guiding structure:

1. Synopsis or summary of the episode
2. Story structure
3. Character analysis
4. Our likes and dislikes

The synopsis: When this episode opens, what we find is that Dr. McCoy is very worried about Spock and he tells Kirk that there’s something seriously wrong with Spock. He’s not eating properly, he’s irritable, and he’s almost nervous to use the doctor’s words and there’s something wrong and nobody can figure out what it is.And Kirk and Dr. McCoy actually witness Nurse Christine Chapel taking some soup for Spock and Spock, throwing it out with some choice abuse for Nurse Chapel.

Now Spock has his pride and he is not going to tell Kirk what the issue is. But he does tell Kirk that he wants to go to Vulcan and there is something on Vulcan, his home planet that will cure him.But he absolutely refuses to tell Kirk what it is. The Enterprise already is on route to a planet called Altair VI, and this is for some sort of ceremonial event that’s happening there. And Star Fleet command has insisted that the Enterprise go there.

They cannot change course, but Spock insisted they change course.Over the course of time, he also manages to convince the bridge that the captain has given orders to change course to Vulcan. And there’s a lot of back and forth and a lot of humor there. But then Kirk finally confronts Spock and demands, orders him to tell him what is wrong with him. And the issue is there’s some sort of a mating season for Vulcans and Spock is in the throws of it and he can’t control it.He must go down. He must get back to Vulcan and have a marriage ceremony held.

Otherwise there’s going to be a lot of problems. And his wife, or the woman that’s supposed to be bonded to him is called T’Pring. Nobody else knew that. So finally, Kirk with a lot of thought he decides to go to Vulcan. And there, there’s this elaborate ceremony for Spock, and the marriage ceremony has to take place.But this woman T’Pring, she’s pretty devious. She decides that she doesn’t want to accept Spock directly. She wants a champion in his place and she chooses Kirk of all people. So now Kirk and Spock have to fight each other to the death. Spock is completely out of his mind with all of his emotions taking over.Kirk doesn’t know what to do exactly.

For one thing, it’s very hot on Vulcan, and for the other, it’s the atmosphere is so thin that he can’t breathe and he is losing this fight. So McCoy injects him with something. Kirk is knocked out and it looks as though Spock has won, and then T’Pring reveals a bombshell that she never wanted to marry Spock in the first place.There’s another Vulcan that she wants to marry, and she devised all this nonsense so that Spock releases her basically.

Or even if he doesn’t release her, she can have an affair with this other guy. So Spock decides not to marry her. They get back to the Enterprise. He’s in temporary command of the Enterprise, but he doesn’t want temporary command because he believes he’s killed Kirk. And then what happens is, we’ll discuss this in detail, but what happens is Kirk is not dead. Spock is very happy.

He shows emotion for the first time, for about half a second, and, yeah, everything is back to normal by then because now whatever was bothering him, Spock is gone with, with the fight and everything.Kirk is alive and all is well.

That brings us to the end of this episode. Thank you for listening to the Podcast Enterprise. Please do share your reviews with us and please share this podcast with any of your writing friends or trekkies. Live long and prosper!

Stay tuned in for our next episode! Enjoy!

Acknowledgements

1. Intro music: Music from anchor.fm
2. Shotcut for editing the podcast
3. References: https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/
4. Descript for editing and video generation