Kirk and Spock are lured to planet where they are made to fight another group to save the Enterprise from destruction.
This is another rehash of the episode 'Arena' that is not as good.
In fairness, it starts quite well despite the daft concept of Abraham Lincoln. The mystery surrounding what they are led to is reasonably engaging at first.
Unfortunately when the action moves to the planet is, for me, the point it starts to really struggle. The notion of 'good versus evil' is presented in a quite simplistic way.
It could have been better if some thought and effort had gone into the fight scenes to make them more plausible and less cheap looking. 'Arena' was brilliant because you had Kirk using his intelligence to overcome an enemy before showing mercy. This has what resembles a canteen food fight and some quite uninspired messages about good and evil.
The presence of Lincoln throughout the episode does not help matters. Knowing he is not real made me not care about his fate and Kirk's behaviour towards him throughout the episode is laughably silly. William Shatner seems very laid back and having fun during moments that are meant to be dramatic. Lee Bergere feels like an actor from an open-air historical museum heritage site where who has to stay in character at all time.
Leonard Nimoy maintains the persona of Spock, but has little material to work with.
The idea of visualising the likes of Kahless and Surak is good, but feels slightly wasted here and the actors are not memorable in the roles. Phillip Pine has the best showing as Colonel Green.
From a creature design perspective it is quite good. Yarnek is fairly well done by the standards of the original series and as a similar concept to the Horta from classic episode 'The Devil in the Dark' it is an improvement.
All things considered, I think it almost scrapes into that category of episode that you could classify as so bad it is good, but it is not quite entertaining enough.
This is another rehash of the episode 'Arena' that is not as good.
In fairness, it starts quite well despite the daft concept of Abraham Lincoln. The mystery surrounding what they are led to is reasonably engaging at first.
Unfortunately when the action moves to the planet is, for me, the point it starts to really struggle. The notion of 'good versus evil' is presented in a quite simplistic way.
It could have been better if some thought and effort had gone into the fight scenes to make them more plausible and less cheap looking. 'Arena' was brilliant because you had Kirk using his intelligence to overcome an enemy before showing mercy. This has what resembles a canteen food fight and some quite uninspired messages about good and evil.
The presence of Lincoln throughout the episode does not help matters. Knowing he is not real made me not care about his fate and Kirk's behaviour towards him throughout the episode is laughably silly. William Shatner seems very laid back and having fun during moments that are meant to be dramatic. Lee Bergere feels like an actor from an open-air historical museum heritage site where who has to stay in character at all time.
Leonard Nimoy maintains the persona of Spock, but has little material to work with.
The idea of visualising the likes of Kahless and Surak is good, but feels slightly wasted here and the actors are not memorable in the roles. Phillip Pine has the best showing as Colonel Green.
From a creature design perspective it is quite good. Yarnek is fairly well done by the standards of the original series and as a similar concept to the Horta from classic episode 'The Devil in the Dark' it is an improvement.
All things considered, I think it almost scrapes into that category of episode that you could classify as so bad it is good, but it is not quite entertaining enough.