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From the opening moment of “Shore Leave” you can tell this will be a different type of Star Trek episode. Kirk’s mistaking a backrub from the lovely Yeoman Barrows to be one from Mr. Spock shows the whimsical and subtlety sexually charged nature of one of the more fun outings for the Enterprise’s crew. Down scouting out a rest stop Sulu exclaims “no animals, no people, no worries,” seemingly shocked to find a planet that isn’t overrun with gangsters, Indians, or Nazis. What they have found is an idyllic planet full of misadventures that looks ever better now fully remastered in living color. It is a good thing that Kirk ignored McCoy’s report of spotting a large white rabbit, not a Florida White Rabbit, a human-sized one (with Alice of Wonderland trailing) or we would never get to visit this “Shore Leave” Planet.

TRIUMPH OF THE BILLKirk & Company save us from the Nazis and proves we can all get alongSantayana once said “those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it,” but in the case of John Gill, he didn’t forget, he just made a really, really bad call. It was a bad call, John, a bad call. Thus goes “Patterns of Force,” in which a Federation historian (this time not an unhinged captain, commodore or woman who wants to change bodies with Kirk for a change showing that even academics can get into the act of nearly destroying, not only one planet, but possibly two) uses Nazi German as the template for a brave new Ayran world. It’s such a great idea that the neo-cons watching this episode as kids probably thought what a great idea this would be oneday…but I digress.