Star Trek episode "The Lights of Zetar"

"The Lights of Zetar"

Season 3, Episode 18.

I can see how Star Trek starting losing it during the third season.

Sometimes, you can tell that the writing was just disinterested. That's because this episode was written by none other than Shari "Lambchop" Lewis and her husband. Not kidding. She even wanted to be cast as the lead, Lt. Mira Romaine, but thank goodness they didn't.

The Enterprise is en route to the total and complete library at Memory Alpha, sort of like a Star Trek Library at Alexandria, and is the inspiration for the cool Star Trek wiki site Memory-Alpha.org.

Scotty falls in love with Mira, and even after the events of this episode is never seen or heard from again (except a novel that is a sequel called Memory Prime by good Star Trek writers, Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens--I haven't read that one).

On the way, the Enterprise is attacked by some kind of unnatural light storm--hey they don't have a better name for it either. The lights take over the body of Mira. The lights go on to destroy Memory Alpha, all the people and the records. Spock says, "The loss to the galaxy may be irretrievable...a disaster for the galaxy."

Spock figures out that the lights are alive. When the Enterprise shoots at the lights, Mira gets hurt. The Enterprise crew boringly sit around a conference table to compare Mira's Starfleet record to what they know about the lights. Her brainwave pattern has changed to that of the lights. The pacing is agonizingly slow here.

The lights come aboard and further merge with Mira. The lights say they have searched for millenia for one to speak through. They are the remaining life force of a dead race, the Zetar. They are stealing her body.

The crew put her in a pressure chamber of some kind that remove and kill the lights because they had become used to the vacuum of space. They die--ah, is this killing? Is it genocide then? I know it appeared to be her or the alien life force but does Kirk now have genocide under his belt?

Then, that's it. The episode ends, with a little character tidbit of Kirk saying something "funny" like this being the only time Spock, McCoy, and Scotty all agree on something. Ha ha. Now give me my fifty minutes back for watching this horrible episode.