Star Trek TOS S1 E13 and 14 Review

Today is another twofer, and both of these episodes are quite important to the future of what Star Trek would become and are also just entertaining episodes in their own right.

The first episode I will be reviewing is called The Conscience of the King. The story of this one involves the Enterprise being called to Planet Q by a man named Thomas Leighton, because he thinks that the leader of a traveling theater troupe performing there, a man named Anton Karidian, is Kodos the Executioner, a brutal dictator who killed half of the population of Tarsus IV, a planet that both Kirk and Leighton grew up on. After Leighton later is found dead, Kirk decides to investigate into the Karidian troupe of actors further. The mystery element of this episode was very fun, and watching the crew try to deal with someone trying to kill their captain made for an entertaining story, with a great twist at the end. It's less of an action packed story and more about the investigation into Karidian's character. Overall, great episode and another standout of early Star Trek.

The other episode I will be reviewing is called Balance of Terror. This one introduces an alien race known as the Romulans, who are introduced as having previously been at war with Earth about a hundred years prior to the events of this show, but it seems that they have violated the treaty and crossed the neutral zone, destroying the outposts along the border, which could be grounds for another war. What follows is an intense cat-and-mouse game between the Enterprise and the Romulan Warbird where they are both constantly matching strategies, to the point where by the end, both Kirk and the Romulan commander have a professional respect for each other, despite being enemies. The combat is very slow, but it worked to build up the tension, and I thought for the first episode focusing on ship combat, it worked pretty well for its time. This is definitely not the last we'll see of the Romulans in Star Trek, but this is a great introduction to them.

Next time, the crew of the Enterprise travels to an odd planet where fiction seemingly becomes reality at random, making for some funny and terrifying results. Our next episode will be Shore Leave.

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