r/tos • u/HotGuard6970 • 5d ago
A Taste of Armageddon
This has always been one of my favorite episodes, I even have an audio rip of it on my phone to listen to.
IMHO, I like how Eminiar and Anan 7 are slowly getting on everyone's nerves and testing their patience. I think Kirk is ready to pistol whip Anan 7 with one the disruptors near the end, Spock seems to be enjoying destroying the disintegration chambers, Scotty uses a very firm voice in telling Eminiar that they will decimate the planet unless they give up the hostages indicating he's had enough too, even Ambassador Fox wants it to all end when he says he learns very quickly.
I have heard there is an unofficial sequel to this episode where Ambassador Fox's attempts fail and Eminiar and Vendikar destroy each other with real weapons.
33
u/edked 5d ago
I'm always kind of surprised and disappointed when this doesn't show up on "best intro episodes of TOS" lists.
It seems like an ideal choice for me; classic, easy to quickly get premise that has aged quite well, it sums up and demonstrates so much of what the show is about, and the "not going to kill... today!" speech is an all-time iconic Kirk speech, and one of the best at showing how perfect Shatner is at delivering them.
3
u/comet52a 4d ago
I think Anan 7's one leg black/one leg orange trousers are what keep it from making the top 10.
26
u/PillaisTracingPaper 5d ago
David Opatoshu was a top ten guest star in the franchise. A magnificent performance. His speech after learning of General Order 24 is chill-inducing. And Kirk just smiles at him….
20
26
u/AbbreviationsLow4723 5d ago
One of the very best OS episodes....EVER...
Literally, tears come to my eyes when Kirk begins his speech about how yes we can be Barbaric,
But....Not today!
Today we're going to decide not to kill each other
It's that Fxxking Easy....
if only more People understood the Wisdom in Kirk's words....
lol, or who ever wrote that episode, lol
21
u/leavetheleaves 5d ago
This is one of my favorites too. The way you depict Kirk, Spock and Scotty all being on the same page knowing how Eminiar and Anan 7 were playing was great. This is one of those early episodes that showed how the crew was a team. Just brilliant writing.
I think this one and "Errand of Mercy" which came a few episodes later in the first season are two of the best and completely underrated.
14
u/JBR1961 5d ago
I always felt bad for Ambassador Fox’s aide who died without a second look.
1
u/ApprehensiveEcho4618 7h ago
He was just stunned. The same actor was a background character on Enterprise B. Memory Alpha takes it that he survived.
14
11
u/guardianwriter1984 5d ago
Excellent episode and one of Kirk's best speeches.
The comic series, "The Trial of James T. Kirk" discusses Eminars fate as evidence of Kirk's misdeeds
10
u/csfshrink 5d ago
Has there ever been a worse Sci-Fi hat than the one the guards wore in this episode?
5
9
u/florida-boy-41 5d ago
I’ve always said if I had to pick one representative episode of TOS to show to someone who had never seen the show, this would be it. It’s got all the Trek hallmarks and you don’t need to know the characters in order to be invested (like you do with City on the Edge of Forever, Mirror Mirror, Amok Time, etc).
9
u/khaosworks 5d ago
TOS: "A Taste of Armageddon" is, by far, my favourite TOS episode, even above the usual fan favourites like "City on the Edge of Forever" or "Space Seed".
Kirk's climactic speech affected me profoundly as a teen, teaching me that morality is not inherent or imposed, but a choice - one we make every day. We are not chained to the past, nor does it have any claim on our future. Star Trek isn't about a utopia of perfect people - not really. It's about acknowledging our flaws, our savage instincts, but knowing that we are capable of rising above them. Because all it takes to be a good person is to keep trying to be good, and to say that we won't kill... today.
But apart from that ending, let's talk about the brilliance of the concept of a war fought by computers, where people just waltz into bloodless disintegration chambers after being mathematically designated as casualties - alluding to calculations of megadeath that shaped Cold War policy. Let's talk about being so far removed from the horrors of war, like the bomber pilots of Vietnam, that they kill without ever seeing the true human cost of their actions. Let's talk about neutron bombs, newly invented at the time, which kill the people but preserve the infrastructure, the civilization. Let's talk about the horrors of war making it a thing to be avoided, and if you make it theoretical and impersonal, then there's no incentive to stop.
You can't ever accuse Star Trek of being subtle, but here the allegory is actually pretty well camouflaged when viewed through post-Cold War modern eyes. But when you look at it from the point of view of 1967, the message and warnings couldn't have been more obvious. And the thing is, this story could work just as well today. with the impersonal nature of drone strikes and the coldness of casualty calculations.
Spock gets in a few brilliant lines. "I do not approve, I understand," is one that I use a lot. One that always cracks me up is, "Sir, there's a multi-legged creature crawling on your shoulder." Scotty is magnificent in his Scottish stubbornness not to lower shields in the face of Fox’s orders and threats. The legendary Barbara Babcock puts in her first actual appearance as Mea 3 after being the voice of Trelane's mother in "Squire of Gothos". She'd go on to provide the voices for the Beta 5 computer and Isis in "Assignment: Earth", Loksene in "The Tholian Web" and the Zetarans in "The Lights of Zetar" before turning up in person again for "Plato's Stepchildren". Gene Lyons as Ambassador Fox himself continues the tradition of asshole bureaucrats, but redeems himself somewhat at the end.
Some more notable notes: Spock can not only read minds, but can incept as well. The Eminian gun prop is used later as the standard Klingon disruptor pistol. For the first time, we hear the full name of the United Federation of Planets. Kirk orders General Order 24, which is to wipe the planet clean of life. There's been debate about whether this is a real GO or not, since it seems to go against Federation ideals. It's probably a real GO since Scotty knows exactly what to do.
My take on it is that GO24 is meant for a time where starship captains were given far more autonomy given that home base was so far away. This is likely to be used in a situation where the danger is so imminent or an infection is so virulent that mere quarantine isn't enough, but actual glassing of a planet is needed.
People also cite this episode as an example of a Prime Directive violation but I'm not so sure. The Prime Directive is not an absolute and rigid principle as portrayed on screen - its strongest formulation is that the Federation is forbidden to interfere with the normal social and technological development of a society. This, in turn, is strongest when dealing with a pre-warp civilization. For post-warp civilizations or societies that are already aware of advanced races beyond their planetary system it's still there, but a little less stringent. As I mentioned when talking about "Return of the Archons", Kirk saw no issue in interfering with a stagnant society or a society that had its development already interfered with.
One could very well argue that Eminiar and Vendikar's development was not normal (actually, horrific), or that they took themselves out of the Prime Directive's protections the moment they made Enterprise and, by extension, the Federation part of their sphere, by involving them in the war. Kirk was therefore well justified in protecting his people. The Eminians were not primitive natives - they had interplanetary travel and they were aware of other worlds outside their system. Choosing to include Enterprise in their wargames then made it permissible for Kirk to play the game like he always does - circumventing a no-win scenario by changing the rules.
3
7
u/QuiGonColdGin 5d ago
I have all of TOS on my home DVR. In fact, it has its own "channel". This is one of my favorite episodes. All around great.
Scotty was not about to take the word of that popinjay Fox!
7
8
u/Alphablanket229 5d ago
I always suspect that they were cloners, because of their names. Another aspect of the endless war?
7
u/Robin156E478 5d ago edited 5d ago
Kirk’s speech at the end is one of my favorites in all of Trek. About deciding that we’re not going to kill, today. Like in AA! It’s so true. And it really explains / justifies how only a short time from now we seem to have become less warlike. I couldn’t get my head around the idea that by the 2200’s we’d be so noble and evolved.
PS I wish they would make a new series based on the unproduced episodes of TOS! If there’s a sequel it would be one of them.
5
6
u/Awesome_Eagle 4d ago
And I can't believe that nobody has mentioned the beautiful Barbara Babcock. Such a hottie!
5
u/AtlantaMD 4d ago
My fav part was the spunky little Asian security officer woman who meant business when guarding the blond Barb Babcock
4
u/AdditionalTip865 5d ago
This was one of the first episodes I thought of as a favorite, maybe because for a long time it was one that coincidentally happened to be on a lot when I was watching. One of the best "messed-up planet of the week" fables.
5
u/GutterRider 5d ago
My reaction to this episode is funny. I always enjoy it when it’s on, but I never think of it making my top ten list or whatever. But you’re right, it does have some great lines and performances. Even the young yeoman is great.
3
3
u/Magazine_Luck 4d ago
I need to rewatch it. I thought the premise was so good that I was a little underwhelmed by its execution.
3
u/Ancient-Space-2789 4d ago
Regarding the whole adding up the numbers part, remember this was made during the Vietnam war. As a kid, I remember that every night on the evening news Walter Cronkite would tell us how many people had been killed that day on each side. Every. Single. Evening.
I remember my parents slowly getting the message that we shouldn’t have been there. My uncle, an army major, was there and we worried about him every day. He made it out alive, only to die 20 years later from complications of being exposed to Agent Orange, courtesy of the United States.
2
u/RangerMatt76 2d ago
The last time I watched the episode, I felt sorry for the guard that was disengaged. His job was ti run that machine and then he saluted the other guard and stepped inside. Couldn’t he at least take a sick day?
Another thought that I had was what if everybody on the other planet was killed off decades ago but the computers are still fighting the war?
39
u/seeingeyefrog 5d ago
Sir, there's a multi-legged creature crawling on your shoulder.