The Cage (TOS episode)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Star Trek: TOS episode | |
| "The Cage" | |
 The Talosians, "The Cage". |
|
| Episode no. | 80 |
|---|---|
| Prod. code | 001 - Restored Version 099 - Original Version |
| Airdate | October 15, 1988 |
| Writer(s) | Gene Roddenberry |
| Director | Robert Butler |
| Guest star(s) | Susan Oliver Meg Wyllie Peter Duryea Laurel Goodwin John Hoyt Clegg Hoyt Malachi Throne Michael Dugan Georgia Schmidt Robert C. Johnson Serena Sande Adam Roarke Leonard Mudie Anthony Jochim Ed Madden Robert Phillips Joseph Mell Janos Prohaska |
| Year | 2254 |
| Stardate | Unknown |
| Episode chronology | |
| Previous | "None" |
| Next | "The Man Trap" |
"The Cage" is the original pilot episode of the original Star Trek science fiction series and resulting franchise. It was filmed in November-December 1964, but never broadcast on television in its complete form until 1988. The episode was written by Gene Roddenberry and directed by Robert Butler.
Contents |
[edit] Primary cast
- Jeffrey Hunter : Captain Christopher Pike
- Susan Oliver : Vina
- Leonard Nimoy : Mr. Spock
- Majel Barrett : Number One
- John Hoyt : Dr. Phillip Boyce
- Peter Duryea : Lieutenant Jose Tyler
- Laurel Goodwin : Yeoman J.M. Colt
[edit] Overview
"The Cage" had most of the essential features of Star Trek, but many differences in cast and terminology. The Captain of the starship USS Enterprise was not James T. Kirk, but Christopher Pike. Spock was present, but not as First Officer. That role was taken by a character known only as Number One, played by Majel Barrett. Spock's character differs somewhat from that seen in the rest of Star Trek: he displays much more emotion than usual.
NBC reportedly called the pilot "too cerebral", "too intellectual", "not enough action", and "too slow", but rather than rejecting the series outright the network commissioned (in an unusual move) a second pilot: "Where No Man Has Gone Before". Rather than abandon the expensive footage, much of the footage was recycled in the later Star Trek: The Original Series episode "The Menagerie", a two part episode (episodes 016-1 and 016-2), which revisited the events of the plot, and made it part of the continuity of the rest of the series. The episode is sometimes listed as episode 80 when shown.
The process of editing ended up destroying what was thought to be the only known color print of the episode. For many years, a print of the original pilot combining color footage from "The Menagerie" with black-and-white footage of the "lost" scenes taken from Roddenberry's all black-and-white print was shown at conventions and later used for early video releases of "The Cage". It was only in the late 1980s that a full-color print was discovered in Paramount's archives.
"The Cage" was aired for the first time in its entirety and in full color in 1988 as part of "The Star Trek Saga: From One Generation to the Next", a 2-hour retrospective special hosted by Patrick Stewart which contained interviews with Gene Roddenberry, Maurice Hurley, Rick Berman, Mel Harris and cast members from the old and new series, clips from both series and the Star Trek films I through IV.
The events of "The Cage" take place 13 years before the first season of Star Trek. No stardate was given.
[edit] Synopsis
The USS Enterprise, under the command of Captain Christopher Pike, receives a radio distress call from the fourth planet in the Talos star system. A landing party is assembled and beamed down to investigate. Tracking the distress signal to its source, the landing party discovers a camp of survivors from a scientific expedition that has been missing for 18 years. Among the survivors is a beautiful woman named Vina.
Captivated by her beauty, Pike is caught off guard and is captured by the Talosians, a race of humanoids with bulbous heads who live beneath the planet's surface. It is revealed that the distress call, and the crash survivors, except for Vina, are just illusions created by the Talosians to lure the Enterprise to the planet. While imprisoned, Pike uncovers the Talosian's plans to repopulate their ravaged planet using himself and Vina as breeding stock for a race of slaves.
The Talosians try to use their power of illusion to interest Pike in Vina, and present her in various guises and settings, first as a Rigellian princess, a loving compassionate farm girl, then a seductive, green-skinned Orion slave girl. Pike resists all forms, so the Talosians lure Pike's first officer and yeoman — both women — down from the Enterprise to offer further temptation. By then however, Pike discovers that his primitive human emotions can neutralize the Talosians' ability to read his mind, and he manages to escape to the surface of the planet along with his landing party.
The Talosians confront Pike and his companions before they can beam up, but the captain refuses to negotiate, even threatening to kill himself and the others rather than submit to the Talosians' demands. Frightened at losing their only hope in their future, the Talosians analyze the Enterprise's records and realize the human race is far too "independent" to be of adequate use to them.
Faced with no other options, the Talosians let the humans go. The others beam up, but Pike remains behind with Vina, urging her to leave with him. Vina then claims she is unable to leave the planet. It is discovered that an expedition had indeed crash landed on Talos IV, and Vina was the sole survivor. She was badly injured however, and left horribly disfigured, but with the aid of the Talosians' illusions, she is able to appear beautiful and in good health.
Realizing that the continued Talosian illusion of health and beauty is necessary for Vina, Pike is ready to return to the Enterprise, but in an act of goodwill, the aliens show him that Vina sees an image of Pike next to her, and they walk up to the entrance that takes them into the Talosian habitat, and then Pike beams up after the Keeper's closing words, "She has an illusion and you have reality. May you find your way as pleasant."
[edit] The Menagerie
Of the 63-minute pilot, some 52 minutes was used in the two-part Menagerie episode, although the final surface scene was altered slightly and used as the Talosians' final message to Captain Kirk. Pike, now able to enjoy the illusion of being healthy and independently-mobile again, accompanies Vina up to the entrance to the Talosian habitat. What had been the Keeper's final words to Pike become the final words to Kirk, slightly altered: "He has an illusion and you have reality. May you find your way as pleasant." The voice over, however, is placed over the threatening scene earlier when the Keeper communicates, with a smug nod, "We may soon begin the experiment."
According to "The Menagerie", Starfleet as a result of the Enterprise's first encounter with Talos IV, placed the planet under strict quarantine, the violation of which was the only crime that still carried the death penalty. Not only that, but when Spock violates the ban, Kirk (as his commanding officer) also becomes eligible to be executed. It is never clearly explained why such a harsh sentence was warranted. (However, the Keeper offers a hint: He tells Pike that if humans and Talosians were to maintain contact, "Your race would eventually discover our power of illusion and destroy itself, too.") At the end of "The Menagerie", Starfleet allows an exemption for Kirk and Spock, but it has yet to be established in Star Trek canon whether the death penalty punishment for breaking the Talos IV quarantine was ever repealed.
[edit] Trivia
- Though never stated officially, The Cage may have been inspired (or heavily influenced) by the 1956 film Forbidden Planet, and through that, Shakespeare's play The Tempest.
- The episode featured the first appearance of green-skinned Orion Slave Girls. An episode of Star Trek: Enterprise titled Borderland, broadcast on October 29, 2004, featured the first indisputable on-screen appearance of male Orions (discounting Spock's unverified speculation of an Orion origin of Thelev, an assassin surgically altered to appear as Andorian in the original-series episode Journey to Babel), 38 years after their species was first mentioned.
- The uniforms worn by Starfleet personnel differ in one substantial way from most future series in that the outfit includes a hat or a cap, though no one is shown wearing one in this film. (One can be seen in Pike's quarters). The idea of a cap being part of the Starfleet uniform would be revived (in an on-again, off-again manner) in the prequel series, Star Trek: Enterprise, which takes place roughly a century earlier than The Cage, although several Star Trek movies featured Starfleet security officers wearing helmets and hats of various different designs.
- Jeffrey Hunter had a six-month exclusive option for the role of Captain Pike. Although he was obligated to continue if the series was picked up by the network, he was not obligated to film the second pilot that NBC requested. Deciding to concentrate on motion pictures instead, he declined the role. Gene Roddenberry wrote to him on April 5, 1965:
-
- I am told you have decided not to go ahead with 'Star Trek'. This has to be your own decision, of course, and I must respect it. You may be certain I hold no grudge or ill feelings and expect to continue to reflect publicly and privately the high regard I learned for you during the production of our pilot.[1]
- Two weeks after the option expired on June 1, 1965, Hunter formally gave his letter requesting separation from the project. He subsequently died in an accident in 1969, leaving Trek fans to ponder how different the later revival of Trek might have been had Hunter continued into the series, if a revival would even have happened. Roddenberry would go on to suggest that it was he, unhappy with interference by Hunter's wife, who decided not to rehire Hunter, but Executive Producer Herbert F. Solow, who was present at the refusal, pointed out in his memoir that it was the other way around.[2]
- A later episode of the Star Trek series, The Menagerie, would establish that the events of The Cage take place about 11 years before the series, or 13 years before The Menagerie.
- Gene Roddenberry considered, at this early stage, having Starfleet be basically a civilian-oriented space service which had no need for ranks. (This is why, in 'The Cage', most officers on the ship wear the same insignia — a single gold stripe on the sleeve — regardless of their shipboard duties.) However, by the time the actual series came to be made, Starfleet was clearly established as being based on the military, specifically the rank system and structure of the United States Navy.
- Some have pointed out Spock's limping on the surface of Talos IV as an error. In fact, this was intentional. Navigator Jose Tyler's hand can be seen wrapped in bandages throughout this episode, and another officer has a bandage on his neck. Although not stated explicitly in The Cage, these injuries came from the battle the Enterprise crew had on Rigel VII (which Captain Pike refers to early on in the story and partly relives through the Talosians' illusions).
[edit] References
[edit] External links
- The Cage at StarTrek.com
- Article suggesting that the Shaver Mystery inspired "The Cage"
- "The Cage" article at Memory Alpha, the Star Trek wiki.
- Internet Movie Database: "The Cage"
| Last produced: None (first episode made) |
Star Trek: TOS episodes Original Pilot |
Next produced: "Where No Man Has Gone Before" |
| Last transmitted: "Turnabout Intruder" |
Next transmitted: None (last episode aired) |
