According to the classic movie Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, James T. Kirk has never faced a
no-win scenario. Except that anyone who’s ever watched the original Star Trek knows that’s not true. He faced
them all the time. Here are 10 no-win scenarios that Kirk faced.
Before we get started, let’s acknowledge that Nicholas
Meyer, writer/director of Star Trek II,
was not steeped in Trek continuity
and actually hadn’t seen much of the original series. Kirk certainly faced
death and loss on many occasions, and several of his victories were either
miraculous or probably short-lived. Or somewhat pyrrhic. This list draws on the
Animated Series and tie-in media to some extent, but is mostly Original Series.
With that out of the way, here are the 10 times Kirk
actually faced a situation where there was no “winning”:
1) Tarsus IV
This is from Kirk’s childhood, but it’s still a situation he
faced. When Kirk was a child, he was a colonist on the planet Tarsus IV, where
a fungus destroyed most of the colony’s food supply. The governor, Kodos,
decided to seize power by declaring martial law — and then divided the
population into two groups, executing half the colony’s population so the other
half could survive. As Spock explains in the episode “The Conscience of
the King,” “Relief arrived, but too late to prevent the
executions.” Kirk had to stand by and watch half the people on the planet
being executed.
2) The U.S.S.
Farragut
Another formative experience for Kirk. His first tour of
duty as an officer on the U.S.S. Farragut, the ship encountered a mysterious
cloud creature that slaughtered the captain and almost the entire crew. Kirk
blamed himself because he hesitated briefly before firing his phaser at the
creature — but in the episode “Obsession,” Kirk realizes that
phasers are ineffective against this creature, and in fact there was literally
nothing he could have done to save the Farragut’s crew.
3) Vulcan
Taking a brief swerve to the new movie continuity… in a
universe where Kirk wasn’t a colonist on Tarsus IV or an officer on the U.S.S.
Farragut, he still faced a huge loss that he couldn’t do anything about. The
entire planet Vulcan gets destroyed in the 2009 Star Trek film, despite Kirk’s
best efforts to save it. Kirk isn’t in command yet when this happens, but it
still takes place on his watch and he has no way to save it.
4) Gary Mitchell
This one is slightly more debatable — after all, Kirk saves
the Enterprise in the episode “Where No Man Has Gone Before.” But he
can’t save his best friend Gary, who’s turned into a superbeing after passing
through an energy barrier. In fact, the whole episode consists of Spock
convincing Kirk, over and over again, that the situation is hopeless and
there’s no way to save his friend and his ship. He has to choose.
5) The Salt Vampire
Meanwhile, the episode “The Man Trap” ends with
afairly clear victory for Kirk —
except that he wipes out the last member of an intelligent species, who had
been living for years without harming anyone.
6) The Organians
When the Federation comes to the brink of war with the
Klingons, the godlike Organians decide to step in and put a stop to it. Sure,
this means Kirk and his crew get to go on living, and the galaxy isn’t
subjected to a brutal war, so that’s sort of a win. But Kirk seems pretty
pissed about it, asking the Organians “What gives you the right?”
Later, Kirk confesses,
“I was furious with the Organians for stopping a war I didn’t want.” If
the Organians hadn’t stepped in, the Enterprise might have been destroyed, but
then again Kirk could have helped score a real victory against the Klingons.
There are lots of episodes where Kirk outwits godlike aliens or shows them that
humanity possesses greatness… but this isn’t one of them.
7) Edith Keeler
Similar to Gary Mitchell, this is a situation where Kirk
saves the Enterprise (and fixes the timeline) — but he can’t save the person
he really wants to save. Once again, it’s up to Spock to make Kirk realize he
can’t have it all. He has to choose between Edith and everything else. All of
the dramatic weight in this terrific episode comes from Kirk realizing that
sometimes you can’t pull off a miracle.
8) Neural
In the episode “A Private Little War,” Kirk is
faced with an impossible choice. The Klingons are arming one side in a local conflict
with superior (albeit still primitive) weaponry. So Kirk decides to arm
“his” villagers with equal weaponry, to level the playing field.
Except, as McCoy points out, “that means you’re condemning this whole
planet to a war that may never end. It could go on for year after year,
massacre after massacre.” Add to that the weirdness that Kirk is possibly
drugged out of his mind by his friend’s wife. The whole episode is clearly
meant to be a metaphor for the Cold War, but it has a super unclear ending.
Kirk instructs Scotty to manufacture 100 flintlocks, but then changes his order
to 100 “serpents, for the Garden of Eden.” The episode’s final words
are “beam us up, Spock. We’re very tired.” And that’s… it. Did they
supply the 100 flintlocks, or did Kirk just decide it wasn’t worth it? Either
way, he’s basically faced a situation where he can’t really win.
9) Vaal
Now we’re starting to reach into tie-in media somewhat. In
the episode “The Apple,” Kirk discovers a primitive society feeding a
dictatorial computer with a lizard head. And Kirk destroys the computer, frees
the people, gives them a few minutes of sex education, and then leaves. In a 1987 comic book,
we revisit the planet and discover that Gamma Trianguli VI was a synthetic
planet created by the survivors of a planetary disaster, who were determined to
prevent their own tragedy from recurring — so they created Vaal to serve as
caretaker of the world. And once Kirk destroyed Vaal, everything went to hell
and the people on the planet set about destroying the entire world again. In
the comic, Spock risks his own life to recreate Vaal, to save the planet.
Because it turns out that Vaal was necessary, and blowing him up wasn’t the
neat solution Kirk thought it was.
10) Dramia II
And finally, an episode of the Animated Series — the
Enterprise crew catches a space plague in the episode “Albatross,”
and only Spock is unaffected. Kirk puts Spock in command of the ship, and
before he leaves he issues General Order VI. This calls for the ship to wait
until the last human aboard dies, wait 24 hours, and then self-destruct. To prevent
anyone else catching the disease. McCoy finds a cure at the last possible
minute — but Kirk was ready to blow up his ship and admit defeat.
Many thanks to our
Star Trek brain trust: Greg Cox, David Mack, Kevin Dilmore and Robert Meyer
Burnett. You guys were a huge help!
Screenshots via TrekCore.
