The Ultimate Computer (bad ending?)

[Terran_Empire]

Just finished this one and I was rather appalled by how it ended.

Here we have a war games drill gone horribly wrong in the worst way imaginable. Hundreds dead and injured across four starships with the USS Excalibur, utterly crippled, going down with all hands...And all we get for closure at the end of this ordeal is the assurance that Daystrom will be getting professional psychiatric help?

Was I the only one thinking "to hell with Daystrom, this is the worst on-screen disaster for the Federation from the Pilot to this point..."

And to wrap up the episode with light-hearted "trio time" humor left a bad taste in my mouth. The Federation and Starfleet have shown much more remorse and concern over the lives of primitives and aliens, even hostiles...you'd expect at least some funeral honors or something on screen...

 

[EnriqueH]

I just finished seeing it myself about 2 days ago and came away feeling like it would've made a stronger Season 2 closer than either Omega Glory or Assignment: Earth, (which is not saying much), but I thought it was a good episode.

I just watched the ending again to see if I could spot what you meant.

When I saw it two days ago and it ended, I didn't feel like it was an inappropriate way to end the show, but I saw it again just now to see what you meant, I guess I kinda see what you mean, but I don't think it's anywhere near as bad as you think.

I actually felt sympathetic towards Daystrom. Here's a guy with big dreams about contributing something, and watched it all fall apart before his eyes, causing death and destruction. What a colossal failure. That would crush anyone.

Overall, I felt it a good episode, but when you put it that way...

 

[Terran_Empire]

It had a great premise but I felt that at times the behavior of Daystrom was so alarmingly inhuman and detached that I had trouble feeling pity for him or relating to his situation.

When the bridge learns that Wesley would now attack the Enterprise with intent to destroy Daystrom's first and only concern is that the M5 will be destroyed...not that more lives will be put in danger, not that he is responsible for the deaths of many already, he isn't even concerned with his own self-preservation...

The man is not right in the head, and it's hard to pity him while imagining all those crewmen and women who gave their lives needlessly, not even in the line of duty but only for an experiment, which if proved successful, would have replaced them entirely.

My issue with this episode is how cheap it made human life feel. Humans who served the Federation in it's prized Starfleet no less...when considering the prime directive and all that "hands-off" benevolence shown unto new peoples, the handling (or lack there of) of all these deaths felt counterintuitive and inconsistent.

 

[Push The Button]

Yes, the "happy" ending to an otherwise sad story is a recurring theme in TOS, the worst example being the ending of The Galileo Seven, where the bridge crew are practically falling on the floor laughing, despite the deaths of several crew members only hours earlier.

One of the few episodes where they got it right was the ending of Catspaw:

McCoy: All of this, just an illusion.
Kirk: No illusion. Jackson is dead.

Shatner's delivery was perfect, conveying the pain and regret Kirk felt at losing even one member of his crew.

 

[EnriqueH]

Daystrom seemed to have good intentions and his creation shockingly destroyed lives. When that happens, and the fingers of blame begin to point at you, it has to be overwhelming.

Daystrom has to live with that for the rest of his life. It's not something somebody probably comes to terms with that quickly or easily.

By the way, I thought William Marshall did a great job portraying Daystrom.

 

[plynch]

Yeah, he makes this ep. It has a theme, too, one of several anti-technology loss-of-humanity eps in TOS.

 

[LMFAOschwarz]

One of the few episodes where they got it right was the ending of Catspaw:

McCoy: All of this, just an illusion.
Kirk: No illusion. Jackson is dead.

Shatner's delivery was perfect, conveying the pain and regret Kirk felt at losing even one member of his crew.

Oh, yes indeed. That was great.

A perfect counterpoint to this was back in the late 80's. I was at my girlfriend's house, and on tv it was reported that there was some terrible calamity (plane crash, maybe?). Around 140 people were killed, and as I watched and commented on it, she said something like "Who cares? I didn't know any of them". I could never quite look at her the same way again. I wasn't expecting hystrionics from her or anything, but damn, woman, have at least a crumb of human compassion!

Thankfully, that relationship was doomed!

 

[Hober Mallow]

Yes, the "happy" ending to an otherwise sad story is a recurring theme in TOS, the worst example being the ending of The Galileo Seven, where the bridge crew are practically falling on the floor laughing, despite the deaths of several crew members only hours earlier.

That's not quite as bad the ending of TNG's "Genesis," where Beverly, responsible for an incident in which at least one no-name crewmember is killed, is cracking jokes. Sheesh, at least wait till the end of the episode to hit the reset button, guys.

I'm not sure where exactly to place the ending of "Enemy Within," and Mr. Spocks, "C'mon, Rand, you know you liked it."

 

[LMFAOschwarz]

I'm not sure where exactly to place the ending of "Enemy Within," and Mr. Spocks, "C'mon, Rand, you know you liked it."

In that episode, I actually feel worse for Wilson, poor guy. There he is, through no fault of his own, doing his job, perfectly nice guy, keeps getting beat up by evil Kirk. Talk about a victim of circumstance!

At least with Rand (not that it's okay), she remained physically unscathed.

 

[EnriqueH]

The ending of the Galileo Seven has always made me cringe.

For years, I always felt it was one of the more overrated episodes. Boma and his requests for decent burials really pissed me off. I didn't think it was realistic or reasonable.

I also didn't like how everyone seemed to be all over Spock, criticizing him and putting him up against a wall, so to speak.

I did like Scotty when he had enough of everyone's BS and said, "That's enough!" I believe directed towards Boma or someone criticizing Spock.

However, in the context of watching it in production order, Galileo Seven improved tremendously in my eyes because I finally saw it in the spirit it was suggested (I think) and that is: the development of Mr. Spock.

I thought the episode had some growth for Mr. Spock as he gains command experience and begins to learn to reconcile his Vulcan and human sides.

But that ending SUCKS.

 

[Warp Zero]

There are a lot of bad endings where the enterprise leaves the planet without really solving the problem. But hey, they only had 50 minutes...

 

[mos6507]

There's the old saying, a single death is a tragedy, but a lot is a statistic. It's a defense mechanism to not be so overwhelmed with grief that you curl up in a ball. That being said, it might have been better to end the episode with a memorial service that would have taken place some time after the incident.

 

[Melakon]

When the bridge learns that Wesley would now attack the Enterprise with intent to destroy Daystrom's first and only concern is that the M5 will be destroyed...not that more lives will be put in danger, not that he is responsible for the deaths of many already, he isn't even concerned with his own self-preservation...

McCoy anticipates this though.

MCCOY: Jim, if a man had a child who'd gone antisocial, killed perhaps, he'd still tend to protect that child.

KIRK: Now he's got you talking about that machine like a personality.

MCCOY: I'm afraid that's the way he thinks about it.

 

[Forbin]

There's the old saying, a single death is a tragedy, but a lot is a statistic. It's a defense mechanism to not be so overwhelmed with grief that you curl up in a ball. That being said, it might have been better to end the episode with a memorial service that would have taken place some time after the incident.

If you've ever seen the notes and memos from NBC to the Trek producers, you'll see the network was overly concerned with upsetting the viewers. Even a little. Back then you tried real hard to end on an up note.

 

[Grant]

The episode would have been so much better served by ending it with Kirk, Spock and McCoy railing against Daystrom and heaping scorn upon him.

The whole "he'll need psychiatric help" was so lame.

 

[Vandervecken]

At least in this one case, Kirk-the-computer-destroyer talking a computer to death made some sense, since the M5 had had Daystromm's engrams made its core programming, and he, although unquestionably loony for the M5, was still remorseful before he went off on his "mere toys" tirade. M5 had more humanity--or morality--left in it than Daystromm did, at least that we could see.

Does it make sense that a computer of M5's abilities wouldn't know that full phasers fired at shieldless ships would kill many, many people? Nope. But that's one of those logical inconsistencies we just have to accept in Trek I guess.

The deaths on the ships were never shown, so that made it easier to press reset for the audience, too.

 

[Robert D. Robot]

There's the old saying, a single death is a tragedy, but a lot is a statistic. It's a defense mechanism to not be so overwhelmed with grief that you curl up in a ball. That being said, it might have been better to end the episode with a memorial service that would have taken place some time after the incident.

If you've ever seen the notes and memos from NBC to the Trek producers, you'll see the network was overly concerned with upsetting the viewers. Even a little. Back then you tried real hard to end on an up note.

This is an interesting point that I had not considered before, regarding notes from NBC for episodes to end on an 'up note', but I think this is one case where the dialog and action in the last couple of minutes should have better and more appropriately (and justifiably) addressed the tragic deaths of hundreds of fellow Starfleet officers and crew on sister ships. I saw this episode recently, and the 'light-hearted "trio time" humor' that the OP refers to at the end of the episode really struck me as oddly cold and antiseptic following the slaughter of their comrades. It did not set well with me.

 

[cgervasi]

I actually felt sympathetic towards Daystrom. Here's a guy with big dreams about contributing something, and watched it all fall apart before his eyes, causing death and destruction. What a colossal failure. That would crush anyone.

It was like he had a baby who grew up to be mass murdering young man. He helped give the baby agency and freedom. The baby used it for evil. He can't help but seeing the evil in himself when he sees M5's actions, the jealousy he felt toward his colleagues trying to take credit for his genius and treating him as a nerd. You get the impression he worked his tail off while his colleagues came from more privileged backgrounds and had stuff handed to them. Daystrom is the "greasy grind" who worked for his success. He wants to lash out violently too. But he doesn't. His creation did. He's crushed to see this evil in something that's a part of himself. He's proud of the power his baby wields against people he imagines think of him as either dweeb doing the cool kids' homework or a useful house nigger, and he's disgusted at himself for being proud of murder. He helplessly says but you're violating basic morals humankind has lived by for thousands of years. How can we ever atone for that?

 

[telerites]

I had not really thought about the ending of the episode but I do see the point. I liked the episode although I thought it was very rushed. Gotta love William Marshall's voice - an opera singer in his early life, correct?

On the converse, Balance of Terror was even more powerful because of its ending. City on the Edge of Forever was big time powerful for me when I first saw as a youngster in the early 70s. The ending especially - first time I heard hell on TV.

 

[Noname Given]

Just finished this one and I was rather appalled by how it ended.

Here we have a war games drill gone horribly wrong in the worst way imaginable. Hundreds dead and injured across four starships with the USS Excalibur, utterly crippled, going down with all hands...And all we get for closure at the end of this ordeal is the assurance that Daystrom will be getting professional psychiatric help?

Was I the only one thinking "to hell with Daystrom, this is the worst on-screen disaster for the Federation from the Pilot to this point..."

And to wrap up the episode with light-hearted "trio time" humor left a bad taste in my mouth. The Federation and Starfleet have shown much more remorse and concern over the lives of primitives and aliens, even hostiles...you'd expect at least some funeral honors or something on screen...

To be honest in the end, 3 Starships damaged; one effectively destroyed. The damaged ships can be repaired; and one of the repeating story elements was often - the USS Enterprise shows up AFTER one ship is already lost (immediate examples - TOS "The Immunity Syndrome"; "The Doomsday Machine", etc.

Was it a horrible outcome? Yep; but:

"...worst on-screen disaster for the Federation from the Pilot to this point..."

IMO - Hardly.

"Balance of Terror": Four Federation Security/Monitoring Outposts completely destroyed.

"Arena" - a Federation Starbase level outpost on Cestus III (including civilians) destroyed and all personnel killed.
^^^^
Both on par or worse then what happened in "The Ultimate Computer".