The Return of the Archons

"The Return of the Archons"

"The Return of the Archons" is a first season episode of Star Trek: The Original Series. It is episode 21, and was first aired February 9, 1967. It was repeated by NBC on July 27, 1967. The screenplay was written by Boris Sobelman, based on a story by Gene Roddenberry, and directed by Joseph Pevney.

Overview: The crew of the Enterprise encounters a world controlled by an unseen leader.

Plot

On stardate 3156.2, the starship USS Enterprise, under the command of Captain James T. Kirk, arrives at the planet Beta III where the USS Archon was reported lost nearly 100 years earlier.

Only Sulu comes back from the first landing party, exhibiting strange behavior, and Kirk beams down with another party to investigate. They find the inhabitants of Beta III (who seem to be modeled after 19th-century Earth) are a very static culture, with little or no individual expression or creativity. The entire culture is ruled over by cloaked and cowled "lawgivers," controlled by a reclusive dictator known as Landru. The only time the people "let loose", and become randomly violent and sexually aggressive, is at the striking of "The Red Hour" (at 6:00pm), starting "Festival", which apparently is the only time Landru does not exercise control over them.

Kirk's landing party beams down just before the festival, and they seek shelter from the mobs at a nearby boarding house. Landru seems to be "all-seeing" and "all-knowing" with spies everywhere, one of whom turns in the party when he does not recognize them as members of "The Body," the telepathic collective being, symbiotic with Landru, that most of the inhabitants belong to.

Kirk and his team are eventually rendered unconscious via ultrasonic waves and captured. However, Reger, the owner of the house, is a resistance member and offers protection to Kirk and his team. Reger reveals that Landru "absorbs" selected people into The Body, which was the fate of the Archon's crew, and will also be the fate of the Enterprise's landing party. The Enterprise itself is now stuck in a decaying orbit as intense heat beams prevent it from using its engines.

Kirk and Mr. Spock, his first officer, discover that the reclusive Landru is actually a computer sealed inside an ancient chamber, created 6000 years ago by a Betian scientist also named Landru. The Landru of that time only wished to create a way to help his failing society achieve peace. The computer was the solution but it performed its job soullessly and ruthlessly.

Kirk and Spock manage to convince the machine that running the planet as it has been is wrong and the people are being kept as meaningless slaves. They manage to convince the machine that it has violated its own prime directive. The machine realizes its mistake and self-destructs, thus freeing the people of Beta III. Kirk agrees to leave Federation advisors and educators on the planet to help the civilization advance, free of Landru's dominance.

40th Anniversary remastering

This episode was remastered in 2006 and aired December 8, 2007 as part of the remastered Original Series. It was preceded a week earlier by the remastered version of "The Alternative Factor" and followed a week later by the remastered version of "A Taste of Armageddon". Aside from remastered video and audio, and the all-CGI animation of the USS Enterprise that is standard among the revisions, specific changes to this episode also include:

• The planet Beta III has been given a more realistic appearance and some dramatic orbiting shots of the Enterprise were established.

Reception

Zack Handlen of The A.V. Club gave the episode a 'B' rating, describing the episode as having a "loose, unpolished feeling" and lacking "the force of the series' best storylines", but praised the story's ambition.

External links

• The Return of the Archons at Memory Alpha
• "The Return of the Archons" at StarTrek.com
• Review of the remastered version of The Return of the Archons at Trekmovie.com