Star Trek: The Original Series: Catspaw (1967)

Season 2, Episode 7
10/10
Robert Bloch uses his Gothic Style to explain Alien Life
29 April 2013
Warning: Spoilers

And anything with Robert's name on it, including the movie "Psycho"
always has tendrils deep into the Dark.

This 1967 Halloween episode is not just about Trick or Treat - It's
about the clash of two cultures that meet in passing shadows - It's
about how badly things can go wrong when communication is the most
important thing but is set aside for to make room for personal wants
and desires that can become greed.

The two extra-galactic visitors which Kirk meets on Pyrus 7 (Which

means category of Pears in the plant Kingdom) were sent from their
home as explorers and emissaries, the same way Kirk and crew are
exploring the outer edges of their Known Space.

The problem with both sets of explorers is that there is no physical

connection to any plane of reality which could be used as a stable
platform for communication - The two visitors can only read the
primeval fears buried deep in the reptilian Brainstem of these Humans-
They cannot see anything beyond this, and from their points of "view"
it appears that things that go BUMP in the night are what Humans are
concerned with. Kirk on the other hand is looking after the safety of
his crew, so from the start, the two groups of explorers are at cross
purposes.

But these two visitors are not united in their own purpose - Korob
(Theodore Marcuse) appears to be a Wizard with a cat who is his
Familiar- But he himself seems to want to bridge the gap of darkness,
he seems to want to DO the thing he was sent to do. But his "familiar"
Sylvia (Antoinette Bower) who appears as both Cat and Woman - Has
had a jolt of power - An Inoculation, and is only interested in the
expressions of using POWER, gaining even more power, and abusing
sensations.

In fact it has totally taken her over. Their ability to manipulate their
surroundings, to create a castle with a dungeon, to make illusions of
Ghosts - Stems from two artifacts: the Transmuter that Korob wields
and the Crystal which Sylvia wears - Both together are creating this
Haunted House, and taking over the minds of the Enterprise Landing
Party.

Sylvia explains this to Kirk as being "Sympathetic Magic" - And she

gives the textbook definition in this episode: She made an image of
the Token Redshirt Victim (Crewman Jackson, Jay D Jones), and
wished the image dead: And when she believed the image was dead,
Jackson died. This is in fact the very way this type of magic works
according to all of the literature about it.

Using Sympathetic Magic, they first heat up the Enterprise, then they
encase it and trap it- And it so happens.

So what could have been a chance for Kirk to meet some very unusual
Aliens- Of a type that in Trek had never before been shown - All
communication breaks down instead. Sylvia wants what she can't have
and what she should not even be wanting, and this sets Kirk into
Defensive Mode. Sylvia goes on a rampage, and kills Korob. But not
before he shows Kirk that the wand he carries around is the amplifier
for the magic Silvia wields in her crystal. With that fact, Kirk is able to
dope out that if he were to destroy it, Sylvia would lose all of her
ability to make her illusions real.

And she basically backs Kirk into a corner, with no other way to reason
with her, he has to take drastic action.

If only more about these aliens could have been revealed - These
weren't just more Humanoids in a galaxy full of humanoids, they were
totally strange. But Kirk met them, and they, unfortunately, met Kirk.
And so in the corner of our minds, where things we don't want to
remember reside, where shadows creep and unmentionable things
happen, in nightmares so dark that Midnight is like noon, Sylvia and
Korob met Kirk and Spock, and then in their natural forms, met death
- Their lifeforms were so unusual that nothing could have prevented
them from turning into smoking goo.

And as Sylvia and Korob were wriggling in the poisonous Oxygen, they
returned to their very Pear-Like appearance, and then melted, like all
witches eventually do.
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