TOS - The Return of the Archons

 I'll forgo my usual detailed analysis and simply state why this is a bad episode. It plays out like a bad Twilight Zone episode.  Unlike some "Worst ever" Star Trek episodes Return of the Archons is not campy or absurd.  There are no "Space hippies",  its just dull and repetitive.  The epsisode suffers from the following problems:

• We get no "strange new worlds". Instead its set in a TV western town with everyone in western garb. That's our "alien society". 
• We have no guest stars.  We get guest character actors. They act well enough, but they have little charisma.  And they're all 100 percent 'murican.
• Its very low budget.  The Computer at the end is box with lights.  The bad guys have broom handles which emit smoke.  Most scenes ocur in bare rooms. 
• There's little action and much talk.  Other than the "Festival" with a few broken windows, screams, and  dead bodies,  we get no sense of physical danger or action.  A slow-walking zombie mob, threatens Kirk and Spock and they put them to sleep with a phaser blast.  That's about it.
• The story is VERY static.  Kirk/Spock  beam down to the Western town (this is the whole planet) to investigate and meet people dressed in Western garb talking in a happy/zombie like manner.  They go to Hotel room and talk to people about the festival.  They meet the "resistance" and walk to another room, and talk some more.  The Bad Guys find out, & transport them to a dungeon.  They talk some more.  They wait to be brainwashed.  McCoy is brainwashed, and we think Kirk has,  and Spock is about to be. But wait, its all a ruse. Psych! The guy who runs the mind altertering machine is a member of the resistance, and lets Spock go, and never brainwashed Kirk.  Spock and Kirk overpower the guards, meet the computer who runs the whole society, and Kirk destroys it.  The end.
• There's little or no humor.  The Dialogue is forgettable. Sulu gets to overact but everyone else is on cruise control. Uhuara and Scotty are given little to do.
• Typical dull Dialogue: You have come to a world without hate, without fear, without conflict, no war, no disease, no crime. None of the ancient evils. Landru seeks tranquility, peace for all, the universal good.
• Its just dull. Very, very dull. I notice the people who like it, don't talk about the actual episode -what's on the screen. Instead, they use the episode as a way to pontificate about philosophical issues.
• Finally,  Kirk's reason for violating the prime directive is weak.  Basically, Archon society isn't a "living, growing Society" so Kirk has to destroy it. While society is controlled by the Computer, it has no problems.  But also total Conformity.  Not my cup of tea, but Kirk decides this is so awful he must totally change it.  Talk about cultural imperialism.  Notice that in order to get us, the audience, to agree with Kirk, we have the ridiculous "Red Hour" and the computer - for no reason - threatening the Enterprise.