"You will be Absorbed", 23 April 2013
This episode spot-on delivers a fist to the face of Religious EXTREMISM. And I hope, it broke some noses in the process.
Extremism is not limited to any particular religion, it can infect any of the worlds great religions. And much like The "Chronicles of Riddick" - If an extremist cannot convert you, they will probably try to kill you.
The idea that the absolute truth is only available to those who believe in one particular religion, is folly and fallacy, and maybe apostasy. And just like the planet Beta III in this episode, we see what happens to a society when all creative incentive is forbidden to the membership and only allowed to the leadership - The society which is based on the religion becomes stagnant.
This difficult-to-watch Star Trek Original Series episode shows how such a society will look, the membership, while outwardly proclaiming peace and Joy, have neither. They are tightly controlled, and Law is upheld by Fear Alone.
Taken one step further, the leadership of this stagnation is a machine! And so we have here the very first Computer-Confounding of James T Kirk's career. He becomes an expert in the destruction of computers using illogic, up to and including V'Ger. So maybe this is not as funny as they way he did it in "I, Mudd" - But the process he uses is very much the same.
On a Side-Note, Jon Lormer, who plays the Illusion "Dr Haskins" in "The Cage/The Menagerie" is "Tamar" - The First casualty of this episode at the hands of "Landru" (Charles Macaulay).
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