By Any Other Name
- FIRST SHOWN (US)
- 23 February 1968
- ON
- NBC
- STARDATE
- 4657.5
- DIRECTED BY
- Marc Daniels
- PRODUCTION NO.
- 50
WRITTEN BYTeleplay by D.C. Fontana and Jerome Bixby; story by Jerome Bixby
Answering a distress call, Kirk's landing party is paralysed by visitors from the Andromeda galaxy, who have decided the Enterprise is exactly the ship they need to get home.
Red alert: the full plot, ending included. Haven't watched yet?REVEAL SYNOPSIS
A distress call leads Kirk to a group who seem human but are Kelvans, advance scouts from the Andromeda galaxy whose ship was wrecked at the galactic barrier. Led by Rojan, they freeze the landing party with devices on their belts and seize the Enterprise for the three-hundred-year voyage home. Most of the crew are reduced to small, porous blocks, leaving only the senior officers. Spock learns that the Kelvans are really vast, tentacled beings who have taken human form to run the ship, and Kirk sees that human bodies bring human feelings they cannot handle. So Scotty drinks Tomar under the table, McCoy keeps Hanar on edge with stimulant injections, and Kirk courts Kelinda until Rojan is consumed by jealousy. Faced with what he has become, Rojan yields. Kirk turns the ship back and offers to help the Kelvans find a peaceful home in our galaxy.
- 01The title comes from Romeo and Juliet, which Kirk quotes to Kelinda.
- 02The galactic barrier was first seen in “Where No Man Has Gone Before” and returns in “Is There in Truth No Beauty?”.
- 03Stewart Moss had already appeared as Joe Tormolen in “The Naked Time”.