Star Tripping

cordrazine-induced psychosis

When Star Trek came to television in the 1960s, the programs that were broadcasted by television networks were constrained by a set of standards. Those content standards allowed for depictions of Enterprise crew members using alcohol, but there was more restraint when it came to the use of other psycho-active chemicals.

In 1966, months before the start of the first broadcast season of Star Trek (the pilot had been filmed in 1964), Harlan Ellison was asked to write an episode for the new show.

1957

I've never read the original story that he wrote for Star Trek, but apparently Ellison included the idea that a crew member on the Enterprise was a drug dealer.

The City on the Edge of Forever
I have no idea why Ellison inserted a drug dealer into his story. I've seen the claim that during the time when Ellison was writing his episode of Star Trek, he visited the studio and watched some of the filming of "Mudd's Women", which became one of the earliest broadcasted episode of the show, seen on TV in the fall of 1966.

20-year-old Diane Pine turns up the
heat on the star ship Enterprise.

The story idea that became "Mudd's Women" was one of the original story ideas proposed by the show's creator, Gene Roddenberry. I've seen it claimed that Roddenberry's efforts to express his sexual fantasies through the filming of "Mudd's Women" had to be curtailed.

rock and ray guns

I wonder if his exposure to "Mudd's Women" influenced Ellison's choices for what to include in his own Star Trek story. Dune had just been published in 1965, a story that features the fictional drug melange. Maybe Ellison toyed with the idea that Star Trek was the right show at the right time to deal with a Star Trip. However, Star Trek was being forced into the future by people like Ellison. Roddenberry was from a more conservative, older generation that was being dragged towards cultural revolution.

Mudd and the three women.

Harcourt Fenton Mudd was an unusual character in Star Trek.  The television show was built around interstellar adventures, visiting newly discovered exoplanets and interacting with newly discovered alien civilizations. Mudd was an opportunist, looking for ways to make money. In "Mudd's Women", we get to watch Mudd scheme to deliver sell three women to lonely miners on a frontier planet.

stories from the 1950s

Chemistry
There is a long history of attempts to build science fiction stories around fictional chemistry. Mudd is depicted as providing his three female passengers with an illegal drug (called the Venus drug). In the end, his goal becomes making sure that the wealthy dilithium miners will pay top dollar for their "mail-order brides".

It is easy to view Mudd as a pimp, using drugs to keep control of "his women". Only by chance does an opportunity arise for Mudd to cash in and make "his women" into brides for 3 rich miners.

In his 1957 story, "World of Women", Harlan Ellison imagined a planet where a drug was used to give women immortality.

Mudd's artificial women

When Mudd returned to Star Trek for another episode, he was surrounded by a harem of sexy robots, programmed to fulfill his every desire.

Why did Gene Roddenberry ask Harlan Ellison to write an episode of Star Trek? I think that Ellison was best known at that time within Sci Fi fandom for "Demon with a Glass Hand". I saw that television program when I was very young, and it left a lasting impression on me; probably my first exposure to the idea of a robot that looks like a man (see the image, below).

robot and Arlene Martel

It does not surprise me that Ellison selected a plot device (a drug dealing crew member of the Enterprise) that offended the sensibilities of Gene Roddenberry.

In 1966, The Avengers had appeared on television in the United States. The origin of these "avengers" was in an attempt to get revenge for the actions of some drug dealers. However, the drug angle really only appeared in the original 1961 episode (Hot Snow) in England and in subsequent comic books. In 1967, Dragnet illustrated how recreational drug use was portrayed on television in the United States. In 1965, LSD was taken off the psychiatric drug market by Sandoz. In 1966, California made use of LSD illegal. In the mid-1960s, recreational drug use was in the news and if the drug was not alcohol or nicotine, it was not going to be welcomed on television.

1967 television depiction of a drug dealer

Why should Roddenberry allow Ellison to depict a drug dealer as a crew member on the Enterprise? No good reason existed.

Episode on the cusp of forever
At a time when some Star Trek episodes were created, filmed and seen on television in just a few months, "The City on the Edge of Forever" took almost a year. Ellison took well over half a year to write the original story then there were more delays due to the episode going through multiple re-writes. Apparently there were only a few of Ellison's original lines remaining in the final version of the story that was seen by Star Trek fans.

Time Travel Trip

The Guardian, a sentient time travel portal.

In "The City on the Edge of Forever", the crew of the star-ship Enterprise finds a time machine on an exoplanet. They use the alien time machine to journey back to the 1930s. After they use the time portal (which is controlled by a sentient being, the Guardian) and return from the past, the landing party just walks away and returns to the Enterprise. I truly despise science fiction stories that depict amazing technological discoveries followed by techno-amnesia; the discovery is forgotten and never mentioned again.

time travel

Asimov's Time Axiom
Time axiom 1: science fiction writers can't resist time travel. Isaac Asimov took note of the fact that we have no reason at all to suspect that time travel is possible, but science fiction story writers simply enjoy creating stories about time travel.

Asimov's time travel novel, The End of Eternity, illustrates another principle, what I'll call time axiom 2: the only good science fiction stories about time travel are those that end with all further time travel having been made impossible. If you don't put an end to time travel than you are committing yourself to some endless Time Travel War.

Time-twisted love: Zarabeth and Spock

Among the time travel stories produced for the original Star Trek show, "All Our Yesterdays" is my favorite. Once again (season 3), the crew of the Enterprise finds an exoplanet where time travel technology has long been in use. However, this planet's star is soon to explode, so Kirk, Spock and McCoy only have a few hours for a quick trip back in time. After Spock has a quick romance with Zarabeth, Kirk, Spock and McCoy return to the Enterprise, the star explodes, and we need not worry about any further use of the doomed planet's time travel technology.

Edith and Kirk

In contrast, Kirk leaves the time travel portal from "The City on the Edge of Forever" behind... the Enterprise just departs. We can imagine the report to Star Fleet Headquarters: "The Guardian of Forever is still there, waiting and able display all of Earth's history." Maybe Star Fleet eventually ends up with a long list of planets (like Talos IV) that are off-limits due to the presence of advanced technology that is simply too dangerous for we bumbling humans.

Several Star Trek episodes depicted romances for the main characters; Kirk, Spock and McCoy. Kirk's love affair with Edith Keeler in 1930 is both tragic and futile. Exactly how Kirk gets the chance to travel back through time to meet Edith is never explained.

McCoy eventually decides that
Edith is not a hallucination

McCoy is the first to go back through time to 1930 while delusional and under the influence of cordrazine, following an accidental overdose. McCoy changes the course of Earth's history by saving the life of a woman, Edith Keeler. In the new timeline created by McCoy's actions in 1930, the Enterprise disappears, but Kirk and Spock remain with the Guardian. Why doesn't the landing party also disappear from the new time line?

Spock brings future technology to 1930

We are not supposed to ask questions about the fictional science in Star Trek, but Asimov provided a solution to this kind of time paradox. In The End of Eternity, Asimov imagined that special technologies could be used to isolate people from the usual flow of time. We can imagine that the Guardian can protect Kirk and Spock from experiencing the effects that arise from McCoy being in the past. Maybe for the Guardian it is all a kind of game; the Guardian conspires to provide visitors with adventures in the past. Maybe the Guardian gets royalty checks from accountants who work in Hollywood.

source

Another axiom for science fiction writers is that they can't resist sequels. With the Guardian still out there, it seems like there should be a followup episode of Star Trek featuring the Guardian (see Star Trek: Galactic Core).

Apples and Oranges
I recently came across a 2015 essay by Noah Berlatsky concerning "The City on the Edge of Forever" (read the Noah Berlatsky essay). Berlatsky wrote that "The City on the Edge of Forever" is "an elaborate exercise in justifying violence".

Berlatsky says that Kirk's need to let Edith die is ethically equivalent to dropping an atomic bomb on Hiroshima in an effort to save the lives of soldiers who otherwise would have died while invading Japan. Berlatsky also claims that when Kirk allows Edith to die, his act is based on the same moral justification that was used for invading Iraq and deposing Saddam Hussein.

"The City on the Edge of Forever" came to television just when Americans were watching the horrors of the Vietnam War unfold on their television screens. Spock mutters words to the effect of: Peace is the way, but now is not the time for peace.

Edith ad astra

Fear mongering is an ever-popular way to get a democracy into a war. "If we wage war now, we will prevent even worse horrors". A populace can be in doubt, but willing to err on the side of caution, feeling that it is wiser to fight a bully than give in to the abuses handed out by the bully. Using that logic, we often abandon the path of peace. Berlatsky also claims that the popularity of "The City on the Edge of Forever" is "inseparable from its rejection of pacifism".

In the Ekcolir Reality
Original cover art by Willis Terry

However, in "The City on the Edge of Forever", there is no room at all for doubt. Kirk and Spock have seen the future and they know: a future in which Edith lives will be worse than a future in which she dies. Under these conditions, viewers also had no doubt: only a fool or a madman would decide to save Edith's life. Kirk had to let Edith die even though he loved her. My expectation is that Star Trek fans have never -and will never- care about this episode's "rejection of pacifism".

Picard's mind trip.
fan favorite: the next generation

Berlatsky suggests that Star Trek fans should abandon their devotion to "The City on the Edge of Forever" and find some other episode to proclaim as a favorite. I have my own reasons (based on my views of what constitutes a good science fiction story) for wishing that some other episode of Star Trek was the all-time fan favorite.

image source

Related reading: some old comments (21) on "City at the Edge of Forever".

Harlan Ellison died about a month after I wrote this blog post.

Next: the science fiction computer game experience

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