The Mark of Gideon makes no sense

[Gotham Central]

You know, I've seen The Mark of Gideon countless times, and yet I'm only now noticing how incredibly stupid this episode really is.

It makes absolutely NO SENSE.

For starters we're shown a planet that is apparently so crowded that people are apparently never alone and its implied that people are literally bumping into each other. We are told that there is simply no room to do anything. Yet the government apparently found sufficient room to build a near perfect replica of the Enterprise. Speaking of that replica, one wonders how they managed to create it in the first place. Wouldn't they need to know what was in every room of the ship down to the smallest detail? Did they literally build a constitution class ship on the planet's surface? Why did it take Kirk so lonf to tell the difference.

Besides all of that, I'm at a loss to understand the motives of Gideon's leaders. WHY exactly are they keeping their population issue a secret? given that they know about space travel, why aren't they colonizing other worlds. Why didn;t they ask the federation to HELP them colonize other worlds. It makes little sense that they would rather import an infections disease rather than shipping people off world.

 

[Captrek]

For starters we're shown a planet that is apparently so crowded that people are apparently never alone and its implied that people are literally bumping into each other. We are told that there is simply no room to do anything. Yet the government apparently found sufficient room to build a near perfect replica of the Enterprise. Speaking of that replica, one wonders how they managed to create it in the first place. Wouldn't they need to know what was in every room of the ship down to the smallest detail? Did they literally build a constitution class ship on the planet's surface? Why did it take Kirk so lonf to tell the difference.

They took Kirk to the “Shore Leave” planet and made him think of the Enterprise so that a duplicate Enterprise was created. (They later erased the memory of the trip from Kirk’s mind.) They flew the duplicate Enterprise back to their own planet, blasted a hole, and buried the duplicate Enterprise. If they couldn’t evacuate an area large enough to house the Enterprise, any people who were there would have been taken care of by the blast.

It makes little sense that they would rather import an infections disease rather than shipping people off world.

Or they could have divided their population into two teams and played the Eminiar/Vendikar game. That sounds like a lot more fun than a disease.

If Gideon had been a TNG episode instead of a TOS episode, they could have set it on Eminiar or Vendikar. The overpopulation would be a direct result of Kirk ending the war games.

 

[Albertese]

Well first let me say that I agree this episode doesn't make a lot of sense. But here's how I think it could have been done...

The Gideon guys built large sections of the Enterprise as well as they could, but not literally the whole thing. Part of their procedure with Kirk involved a doping drug that made his mind susceptible to suggestion. Since he was a little loopy and woke up in what appeared to be the enterprise, he accepted it as such. Not until the drug's effects finally wore off would he realize stuff was amiss and huge parts of the ship were inaccessible. Or maybe it was some sort of holodeck/mindprobe deal that we were led to believe was a replica ship. Maybe they were already planning to open a "Starfleet: the Experience" hotel for a poorly thought out tourism bid and happened to have the thing on hand so... why not?

Anyway, you'd think there would be better and easier ways to solve their problem than what they wound up doing.

 

[Wingsley]

Is THE YOUNG AND THE RESTLESS supposed to make "sense"? How about DAYS OF OUR LIVES?

"The Mark of Gideon" was not supposed to make sense. It was supposed to be an emotional, quasi-romance story, or perhaps better put, it was supposed to be a psychedelic story, like KUNG FU later was. It' was all about Kirk and Odona, just as "The Empath" was about Gem, Kirk, Spock and McCoy, not the Vians.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

It was probably a holodeck.

 

[Basil]

Except for the girl, the episode is crap. Agree with Baba that it should have been explained with some version of a holodeck.

 

[Anticitizen]

Sounds like they needed a Kodos to solve their little resources problem!

 

[Admiral Pike]

Besides all of that, I'm at a loss to understand the motives of Gideon's leaders. WHY exactly are they keeping their population issue a secret? given that they know about space travel, why aren't they colonizing other worlds. Why didn;t they ask the federation to HELP them colonize other worlds. It makes little sense that they would rather import an infections disease rather than shipping people off world.

Um, a starship at this time can carry just a few hundred people. Even if they could build a thousand ships per year, and each ship could carry a thousand people, it'd still take 1000 years to ship off just a billion people. And considering their situation, this planet is likely home to at least tens of billions of people. And the off-shipping will probably be much lower than the population increase anyway.
So trying to depopulate the planet with starships will prove to be an utterly futile endeavour.