Catspaw

This one's somewhat of an oddity among the Trek episodes of the original series, an episode cobbled together for no other reason than to fit a Halloween theme. There are no other reasons for its existence, no profound ideas explored, no stretching of the imagination. Bloch, the premiere horror writer of the time, penned the script (he also wrote "What Are Little Girls Made Of?" in the previous season). The paradox to this effort, though, is that there doesn't seem to be a sincere attempt to offer scares: the creators and actors approach this with a tongue-in-cheek attitude after the first and only death in the pre-credits sequence. This lightweight approach is most evident in the early encounter with the 3 witches: Kirk asks Spock for a comment; Spock's response, along with Kirk's and McCoy's reactive expressions, sends me into guffaws every time I see it - maybe the single most hilarious moment during the season (and that's saying something, as "I,Mudd" and "The Trouble With Tribbles" are coming up soon). Later, of course, we have the scene in the dungeon, when Kirk refers to 'Bones' and then notices the skeleton hanging nearby. BOO!

There is, admittedly, a half-hearted attempt at exploring the conflict between physical senses and pure mentality. There is a tendency in the Trek series to depict aliens who hunger for the potential of physical sensation we human beings represent. Usually, such aliens may take human form temporarily, as Sylvia & Korob do here, and the new sensations corrupt them - apparently, only we humans can handle the, ah, sensuous nature of the ability to touch something or someone physically (see also the later "By Any Other Name"). But, the episode never really makes it clear what these aliens want - all we get is the Halloween mumbo-jumbo: a foggy mist, the witches, a black cat, crew members turned into zombies, a dark castle with cobwebs and, finally, the warlock and sorceress with a wand. These aliens do prove to have impressive abilities, even by the standards of 23rd century technology, and it is explained that they tapped into our subconscious to produce this bizarre scenario, but otherwise, it's just those silly spooky elements interspersed amid a plodding storyline. There's a brief reference to 'the old ones' by Korob, the beings he and Sylvia serve, which conjures up images of Lovecraft, rather than aliens from another galaxy. The episode is capped by some of the worst FX, involving puppetry, of the series. This was, by the way, the first episode of the 2nd season to be filmed, and so is the first appearance of Chekov.

Holy space-cows what a mess! One of James Pevney's relatively weak early efforts was this Halloween episode of TOS - complete with black cats, witches, zombies, skeletons, dungeons, and magic wands. In retrospect, Catspaw (especially the not-so-special effects) is laughable, but not entirely without merit. Shatner and guest stars Theo Marcuse and Antoinette Bower have some great scenes. Sadly, the very talented Marcuse passed away a month after this episode was aired. Had he lived into his 50s and 60s, he could have become the 1970s and 1980s Vincent Price.

An away team suffers a casualty and a few missing crew members, including Sulu and Scotty. The holy trinity (Kirk, Spock and McCoy) beam down to investigate. On the planet's surface, they quickly encounter a trio of ghosts, a medieval-looking castle, and a black cat. Kitty leads them to a trap and they wake up chained up in a dungeon.

Some would say this is all pure schlock, but there are a few aspects of Catspaw that make it worth seeing. As I have mentioned, some of the acting is quite good. It's also worth thinking about the ambiguity of what goes on in the episode. On one hand it comes off as just another omnipotent alien episode, but these aliens are pretty different, and its not clear how much power they really have outside of their own minds and the minds of the Enterprise crew. Unfortunately, though these ideas are raised in the episode, they are also inadequately explored in this straightforward goth adventure story.

Season 2, episode 7. The Enterprise is at Pyrus VII. Sulu, Scotty & Crewman Jackson has beamed down to investigate. The Enterprise has lost contact with them for awhile but Jackson communicates he is ready to beam aboard and when he does, he is dead. A strange voice is heard coming from Jackson so Kirk, Spock and Bones beam down to find out what is going on and what has happened to Sulu & Scotty. When the 3 beam down, they see thick fog, 3 witches, an eerie castle and a black cat upon entering the castle. They meet Korob & Sylvia, end up in a dungeon and find that Scotty and Sulu are in a trance of sorts and obeying the will of the two sorcerers. The sorcerers use their magic against the Enterprise, Bones ends up in a trance-like state while Kirk & Spock try to figure out a way to beat the sorcerers and save their ship & crew. Sylvia becomes very cruel and disputes with Korob. Korob decides to help Kirk and his crew because he feels that Sylvia is going way to far.

One of those "fun" episodes. It first aired just before Halloween in 1967... it really does make a great Halloween show. I still love this episode even though it is not as popular nor rated as high as some of the others.

9/10

DONT LISTEN TO CRITICS AND DONT PAY ATTENTION TO THE LAW RATINGS , ITS JUST SOME HATERS.

Whats the problem with you guys rating this one 6/10 ? This is a far better episode than some in Season 1 rate 8/10. Is It because the Bad guy is a cat/witcher.

" Catspaw" is actually a very intelligent episode with an Amazing twist in the end.

The 5 most important characters and most important Enterprise member are Trap in a strange castle fuel with human nightmares. A very good Star trek, if It was a season 1 episode or would have been a 7.5/10 for the stupid people review. So please dont listen to critics and dont play attention to the Law rating In all objectivity m'y note 8.5/10.

When travelling in space interstellar, you may find a cat Barbarella, mix of Jane Fonda, a spy film James Bond(a), find them under a castle in the cellar.

Telepathic and telekinetic torture, as a couple of mindless moggies make mayhem for the Captain and his men.