Mind-Sifter is the latest episode of
Star Trek: New Voyages
(or
Phase II now), made in New York by a dedicated crew of actors, writers and
technicians all headed by super-fan James Cawley.
Like most fan produced Star Trek shows (including Star Trek:
Hidden Frontier in which I worked on), there are some good elements and bad
ones. New Voyages has a step-up on most other shows as Cawley has recreated the
bridge of Enterprise and other sets to lend a more realistic approach than HF,
which relied on green screen, computer generated sets.
Mind-Sifter has a teleplay by Rick Chambers, and is based on a
story by Shirley Maiewski, a longtime fan as well, her original short story, in
which this episode is based on, was first published in the fanzine Showcase #2
in 1975 and was later reprinted, in an edited version which she did not
authorize, in one of two volumes of fan-produced short stories published by
Bantam in the 1976 and 1978 called The New Voyages.
In her original story, Captain Kirk is tortured (offscreen,
the story starts in the aftermath) by Klingons to get information about time
travel and then stranded on 1950s Earth, where he ends up mostly amnesiac and
unresponsive in a mental hospital, with some brutal orderlies and a caring
nurse who falls in love with him. Eventually he gets rescued by McCoy, Chekov
and Spock.
In the filmed version, Captain Kirk (Brian Gross) has
vanished on a mission, captured by the Klingons, who torture him to get
information on the Gateway (featured in TOS episode The City on the Edge of
Forever, one of many nods for the fans) so they can obtain time travel. Eventually
the Klingon’s mind-sifter works out the location of the planet on which the
Gateway is, and Kor (Clay Sayre) and his cohorts arrive there only to discover
the Gateway will not communicate with them. However, it will talk to Kirk, who
asks it to reveal Earth’s history. But like many villains, Kor’s posturing
distracts him enough that Kirk is able to break away from his captives and jump
through the portal, which dumps him somewhere in upper New York in 1958 and
where he becomes mostly amnesiac and unresponsive in a mental hospital. While there are
“brutal orderlies”, the nurse has become a Doctor, Jan Hamlin (Rivkah Raven
Wood, AKA to Hidden Frontier fans as Rebecca Wood).
Meanwhile, after several weeks of not being able to find
Kirk (and they assume him dead), Admiral Withrow (Robert Withrow) arrives to
promote Spock (Brandon Stacy) to Captain and send him and the Enterprise crew
on a mission in the opposite direction of where Kirk vanished. While Spock
follows orders, this sends a wave of uneasiness to the crew, who feel the need
to mourn the loss of Kirk. In particular, Doctor McCoy (Jeff Bond), who
(apparently after years of knowing him) is surprised at Spock’s detachment from
crew. Of course, with Spock, all is not as it seems, as we learn towards the
end of the episode that he and Kirk do have a deep connection that allows the
Vulcan to figure out the complicated plot.
What works here is the acting, something that can be
surprising in these fan-produced shows which usually cast non-actors. Brian
Gross, who takes over for creator James Cawley as Kirk, is splendid. At the
risk of starting a flame war, Gross is so much better than Cawley (who finances
this series through his stage work as an Elvis Presley impersonator, and who
seems to be playing Elvis, playing William Shatner, playing James T. Kirk. His
scene chewing performances has always distracted me). He brings a much more
subtle approach to the character; it’s not so much an impersonation of Shatner,
but more of an alternate universe version of him without all the silly
theatrics and body motions.
Along with the ever talented Wood, who can take the weakest
script and make it shine, they create a believable doctor/patient act –even if
there star-crossed love match is just a reworking of the Kirk-Edith Keeler
romance from City.
However, it’s Brandon Stacy who gets to really shine as
Spock. New Voyages has gone through a number of actors who’ve played the
classic characters, but Stacy is the strongest one yet to play the Vulcan. His
Spock is logical, emotionless, but shrewd. You see the wheels spinning in his arguments
with Doctor McCoy on leadership and loyalty. The watcher is compelled to try
and figure out what Spock knows –because you know that despite following
orders, he clearly is still searching for Kirk.
While I like Jeff Bond, who takes over the role of McCoy in this
story, much better than the previous actor, his take on the “old country doctor”
motif is more than original actor DeForest Kelly ever played him. Plus, I don’t
buy into the whole notion that McCoy needs to be Spock’s conscious. If this
series is set sometime beyond TOS three year run, the working relationship
should have evolved, which means McCoy should’ve trusted Spock.
Issues:
The episode is overlong, in the end –it runs over 65
minutes. A good 10 to 15 minutes could’ve been excised and the story would not
have suffered.
The whole Klingons want time travel knowledge subplot seems
to go nowhere –it’s never clearly explained why they want it (for a Klingon, I
think, would time travel be considered cheating? Is it time travel honorable?)
Had this been produced as a real episode of TOS, Doctor Jan
Hamlin would’ve remained a nurse, as she was in the short story. While I have
no issue with this bend to feminism, it shows that Cawley -who seems to want to his Trek very close to the original in so many ways- is willing to admit that it's 2014 and not 1969.
There is some horrible, over the top dialogue given by Spock
on how everyone (the Klingons and humans) should be able to get along. It’s completely
out of place here and comes off more eye roll inducing than anywhere near inspiring.
Nice to see a Native American on the bridge of the
Enterprise.
The CGI effects are top-notch, so is the cinematography and
location work.
James Cawley’s cameo is funny, but also self-aware (“I hate
that guy”). It should’ve been edited out.
This episode, apparently, began production back in June of
2011. There are two clips (both released in February of 2012), on Youtube which
show some scenes, but obviously they were re-filmed over the last few years
with different actors. This is, of course, the nature of these fan productions.
People come and go when time allows (no one gets paid, except the big name
actors that have been drawn to the show) and the scenes that make up an episode
are filmed out of order and sometimes there could be months between filming one
scene that leads into the next. I’m sure it’s a logistical nightmare to keep
things straight.