WARNING: This thread WILL contain unhidden spoilers for this entry. Because this re-watch is in a slightly-subjective chronological order and not in production order, please refrain from talking about the content of other episodes or movies in this thread. If you do, please put that content inside spoiler tags. Some people here may be watching Star Trek for the first time.
#19: Star Trek: The Original Series, season 1, episode 15 “Shore Leave”
Written by Theodore Sturgeon, directed by Robert Sparr.
Stardates 3025.3 through 3025.8 (September 2267)
“These experiences were intended to amuse you.” - The Caretaker
The Enterprise finds a lush and uninhabited planet similar to native Earth and Captain Kirk has select members of the crew perform a survey before beaming down the crew for some much overdue shore leave. As McCoy watches Sulu become excited about collecting flora samples for study, he suddenly runs across a giant, upright rabbit wearing clothes and checking a pocket watch while lamenting that he’s running late. Not some alien creature, but something right out of a fairytale. McCoy cannot make rational sense of what he saw and declares himself unfit for duty… until other members of the survey team begin seeing things, realistic and fantastic, that should not be there.
Originally released: 29 December 1966
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What did you think?
Visual effects comparison of the original broadcast & the Remastered versions.
That’s the best expression McCoy has ever made (so far).
Also, let’s take a moment to appreciate that Kirk was enjoying the back rub until he realized it wasn’t Spock. Then he promptly ended it.
I kinda feel like McCoy makes a similar expression almost every ep, but YMMV.
Fun ep, probably for everyone who doesn’t take sci-fi hyper-seriously (just my guess of course). For me, the Finnegan character was probably the highlight, and I thought he and the stunt people did a great job on that sequence. Indeed, at many points you can pretty-easily see the stunt people conspicuously doing their thing, there.
Was this the original episode most responsible for the creation of the holodeck, next series? It certainly seems like a strong candidate!
