“The Omega Glory” is an example of a writer who has a good story to tell, but is unable to tell a good story. The premise, that war (and in this case biological warfare) can utterly ruin entire civilizations, causing them to slur even their most precious ideals is a worthy one. Heck, the consequences of bio-warfare alone are important on their own. The additional layer of losing cultural identity as a result of war in general only adds to a potentially complex and deep study. And for perhaps the first third of the show, the episode seems well on its way to being able to realize a great deal of its potential.

And then the bottom falls out and the audiences is accosted by the kind of in-your-face flag waving American patriotism that belittles the real value of the ideals of America. It’s a cruel irony that the episode is an example of the distorted patriotism it will eventually criticize. Such an overt and unrelenting parade of opinion is more likely to turn people away from the message. And instead of the episode being an allegory for the ideas behind such words as “We the people” it becomes simply another example of us Americans beating our chests and acting as though we’ve cornered the market on words like “freedom” and “allegiance” and ideas like good always being triumphant over evil.

And this episode was written by Gene Roddenberry himself.

Things start off promisingly enough with the Enterprise coming upon a seemingly deserted Federation starship. Once on board, they discover that all hands (except for the captain) have died as a result of a deadly and mysterious disease. After beaming down to the planet, they learn that there had once been a great biological war and the crew of the Exeter had taken the disease onboard ship. That the captain of the Exeter has survived and become embroiled in the continuing conflict – though by now it has degenerated into spears and bows and arrows – so as to utilize the planet’s natural immunizing properties for profit, adds an additional layer to the story through the idea of the Prime Directive.

But the episode falls apart when it pivots to explain the origins of the two factions, known as Yangs and Kohms. As it turns out, Kohms is a derivative of “Communists” and Yangs is a derivative of “Yankees” and the whole ball of wax is taking place on a parallel Earth that had succumbed to biological warfare (whereas Kirk’s future Earth had avoided it). It’s a clumsy, blunt approach that clubs the audience with the episode’s intended message about understanding the real meaning and purpose behind the words of the Pledge of Allegiance and Declaration of Independence, and behind symbols like the American flag.

It would have been enough to leave the names of the factions vague, letting viewers read their own interpretations of them. The overt use of the flag, while a powerful image, is simply unnecessary and is, in fact, overly gratuitous. The real meaning of the flag wasn’t intended to have it paraded around a hokey science fiction show – just to make sure viewers remembered what it means. And, too, I find it difficult to believe that viewers up north, or across the Pond (or anywhere else in the globe) really care that much about Americana to really have wanted to see the American flag at that moment of the episode.

Even worse, the performances and production are just as clumsy as the story. The music is too reminiscent of silent movies when a “dun-dun-dunnnn!” was actually necessary. Kirk is in full caricature mode. And the villain just goes off the deep end killing everyone and everything just to make some cash – despite his training not just as a Starfleet officer, but as a captain as well.

“The Omega Glory” had great potential. But this episode is just too blatant, too obvious, too crass to be of any real, lasting value.

Filed under: Original Series