What an awkwardly appropriate way to end a series. “Turnabout Intruder” is, on its surface, a terribly sexist and derogatory episode. Indeed, the surface level story is enough to draw a significant amount of ridicule – and justifiably so. But lurking just below the surface is a story that successfully draws upon the history and camaraderie of the crew to solve what might be the most dire crisis to face the Enterprise. In the end, it is the crew’s love of, loyalty to, and friendship toward, the captain that pulls the ship out of a seemingly no win situation.

The episode starts with Kirk, McCoy and Spock beaming down to a planet to care for Janice Lester, an apparently ill woman with whom Kirk shares a past. While Kirk is left alone with her, she catches him off guard, stuns him, and then proceeds to utilize an alien device to swap minds – making Shatner portray Lester’s character (all apparently because women can’t be captains, or something).

Shatner-as-Lester is so ridiculously over-the-top that it’s impossible to take the performance (and therefore the episode) seriously. Meanwhile, the Kirk trapped in a woman’s body is constantly kept subdued by way of tranquilizers – to keep (him) her from making trouble. The setup here is simply preposterous, implausible, and embarrassing. It’s just awful. And what does it say about the Trek universe where women cannot be captains and a woman is restrained for hysteria simply because the captain says she must be?

The rest of the episode, then, is about how the crew discovers the truth of the matter and rally around their true captain, stuck inside the body of Lester. On this level, the episode works. It demonstrates the deep history, loyalty and camaraderie between captain and crew. And serves as a suitable recap of the many adventures and trials they have shared and faced together.

So despite the ridiculous beginning, the episode manages a fairly compelling sendoff to a series that captured the imagination of legions of fans. On a personal level, I wasn’t quite sure what to make of this series. I had seen the movies, of course – they were my entry point to the Star Trek franchise. And I have long been a fan of TNG. So I was curious to see how well the Original Series would fare so long after its initial run – and given my personal biases, as well.

In truth, the Original Series, was a brilliant concept that struggled mightily to find strong, confident execution. Even so, there are still a number of truly compelling episodes within these three seasons. And it’s easy to see why this series is still adored by so many. The fact that it isn’t quite up to the standard of TNG in terms of production and story execution almost doesn’t matter – the chemistry of the crew, and some of the story ideas are almost good enough to compensate.

In many ways, “Turnabout Intruder” is indicative of Star Trek – some good ideas alongside some terrible concepts and execution. In this case, the swapping of genders doesn’t provide any real exploration of gender in general, and yet the focus on loyalty and camaraderie is a great success. Such is the fate of the Original Series – some fantastic highs, and some abysmal lows.

Filed under: Original Series