One of the most ridiculous and bad epiosdes of TOS is Arena. Credit to the laughable Godzilla that Kirk so skillfully fought. These dragons, dinosaurs and elephant snails are just as bad. Ridiculous. I can't take this episode serious although the notion of a zoo, just like in TOS's original pilot The Cage, is fascinating. What could have been perhaps a 7/10 is only mediocre due to the strange creatures and the repetitive element of being imprisoned by telekinetic zookeepers.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParent2017-07-27T04:48:26Z
[7.7/10] Now that’s more like it! This one felt like a classic TOS episode, with Kirk, Spock, and Bones getting stranded in a weird situation and having to figure out an unorthodox solution. I really enjoyed the notion of the Lactranians, who, rather than just being the usual humanoid forehead aliens, were elephantine slug creatures who were, neverheless, far more advanced both as a species and civilization than our heroes. It’s the sort of outside-the-box presentation of alternative life forms that I really appreciate from this franchise.
And god help me, I’m a sucker for these “humans get treated like zoo animals” stories. (It may help explain why I liked “The Menagerie” so much.) There’s something about our heroes getting confined not because their captors are bad guys, but just because there’s a communications failure between them. The story choice to make it a child Lactranian who accidentally is beamed aboard the Enterprise, but realizes Kirk & Co. aren’t mindless animals, is a good one. The same goes for the aliens’ realization that the crewmembers shouldn’t be kept in a zoo and are intelligent, even if not quite as intelligent as them.
It’s a nice example of the “seeking new life and new civilizations” ethos of the show brought to bear. The episode can get a bit overexpositional at times (particularly when the main trio beam down to the planet and are trying to figure out what’s wrong and why), and there’s some filler like a fight scene with a water dragon, but on the whole, the episode moves at a good clip, has a neat concept with interesting alien foils, and comes up with a nice way to resolve everything as well. One of the most enjoyable episodes of the show in a while.