TOS - Plato's Stepchildren

Plato's Stepchildren is a perfect example of why TOS Season Three was so terrible. We start off with an interesting concept. A group of Space Aliens, after a brief sojourn in Ancient Greece, settle on a new Planet. After 2,000 years, the Enterprise comes calling and meets these ageless "Greeks" with vast mental powers.

Plenty of possibilities here. 

How do they handle being almost immortal and ageless? What have they done with their vast amounts of free time, meditation, and study? How has Greek philosophy formed their society?

But We get none of that.

These "Ancient Greeks" are just shallow, arrogant, self-entitled jerks. And there's nothing "Ancient Greek" about them, except their customs and dress. They just as easily could've been 18th Century aristocrats or Romans.

And the entire episode consists of these "Greeks"  trying to force McCoy to stay behind, by subjecting Spock and Kirk to sadistic humilation and torture. Almost 13.5 mnutes of it.  Here's the breakdown:

12:00 to 12:30 - Kirk is forced by Parmen to slap himself for 30 seconds.

19:45 to 25:15 - Kirk is forced to sing/dance, be a horse, and grovel.  Spock is forced to sing/laugh.

38:45 to 45:15 - Spock is forced to sing to, kiss, and threaten Nurse Chapel.  Kirk does the same to Uhura, except no singing.  

It should be noted that the last two scences are accompanied by McCoy shouting for Parmen to stop it, while we get close-ups of Alexander (looking pained/disgusted) and Philania (amused or excited).  

The Simple simon plot 

Act I - Hello there earthlings, please save our leader, he's ill. Have you met Alexander? He's small and pathetic. We like to bully him.
Act II - Please don't go Doctor McCoy - otherwise we'll have to Kill/torture your friends
Act III - Torture and Humiliation of Spock, Kirk
Act IV - Oh no! Now, you're more powerful than we are. Don't punish us, we'll be good. Adios Captain Kirk!

Now, is the episode boring? Nope. Torture and humiliation are never boring. But its very unpleasant. And when all is said and done, what is the point? Absolute power corrupts? Yeah OK, but we've had that moral/message about 10 times already.

The Annoying Alexander
I found Alexander very annoying this time round. His character is so pathetic, and the writers try to manipulate us into hating Parmen and his wife for bullying him. And cheer Alexander for being so cute a and lovable. Subtext? "Those upper-class Greeks may be beautiful and smart, but  they're really snooty swine,  The ugly little person, the outsider, the oppressed minority, is the only decent one in the bunch.  Its terrible, how they abuse him! 

Its such an old Trope. Remember the movie Spartacus? On one side, the nasty decadent Roman Aristos. On the other hand, the decent, full of life, salt-of-the-earth slaves. This is just another riff of that old tale.  

And again, what is the point? Why would they still be so nasty to him after 2,300 years? Why wouldn't any of that noble Greek philosophy and endless meditation have an effect? 

Typical Dialogue:

ALEXANDER: You think that's what I want? Become one of them? Become my own enemy? Just lie around like a big blob of nothing and have things done for me? I want to move around for myself. If I'm going to laugh or cry, I want do it for myself. You can keep your precious power. All I ask is one thing. If you do make it out of here, take me with you.

Other problems 

This is one of the lazier TOS scripts. Not only do we do "The Greeks" again (see Who Mourns for Adonis) but once again, we have a set of all powerful space aliens who have trapped our crew and need to be taught a lesson in humility.  We even get the patented Kirk "You've forgotten how to live" speech. The sets are cheap, and character development is minimal.  Alexander is the only character who shows any complexity. Parmen is an arrogant evil one-note johnny.  Philana is the same, only vain. Spock is given little to do. McCoy just protests he won't stay. Kirk is Kirk.  Memorable quotes are few. 

In addition to the 13.5 minutes of Torture porn,  we get 2 minutes of objects flying around when Parmen is delerious with fever, and another 1.5 minutes of Kirk/Parmen playing Ping-pong with a knife wielding Alexander.  Almost 17 minutes of  badly done "action". 

The Acting
Probably the best thing about the episode is the acting. Barbara Bobcock, Liam Sullivan, and Michael Dunning are very good in their roles. Too bad the story/script is so bad.

Reviewing the Reviews

Given how sensitive most Star Trek internet male reviewers are, I expected them to dislike the episode and be turned off by the sadism.  After all,  a few words of "Sexism" reduces them to tears, so all this unneccessary abuse of Kirk/Spock/Uhura/Chappell should really get them going.  Wrong!  Hey, they have no problem with it,. In fact, some of them seem to be into torture porn and only wanted Kirk to get some payback.  Otherwise, they go on and on about how great Alexander is, and hey, what about that 50 year old inter-racial kiss?

But   the  Fascinating star trek podcast has a wonderful take.   One of them likes the episode because he wants Shatner/Kirk "Taken down a peg".   And both wonder if the writer was expressing  his hatred of the two stars!

Summary:  This episode is the closest TOS ever came to trashy, sadistic sex porn. If you like seeing our heroes abused and humilated for 12 minutes or love little people, this episode is for you.  Myself, I consider it one of the worst.