I am celebrating the 50th anniversary of the premiere of Star Trek by celebrating my five favorite episodes from the original series. My #3 favorite is Paul Schneider’s “Balance of Terror,” which is very clearly inspired by the classic submarine film The Enemy Below. Far too often, imitation of a previous story is nothing but a lazy shortcut to mediocrity – but in this case, the imitator is every bit as fine as its original inspiration. And there are some ways in which this work surpasses its precursor because the action is compressed into less than a single hour- meaning that scarcely a moment is wasted.
As the episode begins, a wedding is about to take place in the ship’s chapel, but the service is taking place against a most ominous backdrop: all contact has been lost with one of the far-flung Federation outposts perched on the edge of the Neutral Zone between the Federation and the Romulan Empire. Sadly, it is just as the wedding ceremony begins that an alert is sounded from the bridge; yet another Federation outpost has called for help, having been attacked by an unknown and invisible enemy vessel.
It turns out that the U.S.S. Enterprise and this mysterious Romulan vessel are rather evenly matched, except that the Romulans possess two frightening technologies that the Federation does not: a cloaking device that renders their ships essentially invisible and undetectable… and an offensive weapon far more powerful than anything the Federation has yet developed. It is for this reason that Captain Kirk must call upon all of his cunning in order to prevail.
This is the first time in the series that we encounter the Romulans- and there is quite a dramatic moment when the Enterprise is able to tap into some sort of signal aboard the Romulan vessel and beam aboard images from their bridge…. which marks the first time in history that anyone from the Federation has knowingly set eyes on a Romulan. It is tremendously shocking when the Romulan commander (who is brilliantly portrayed by actor Mark Lenard) steps into range of the camera and everyone on the bridge sees how his appearance is almost exactly the same as Mr. Spock, who is Vulcan. That first glimpse of what an actual Romulan looks like stirs deep and bigoted feelings in the mind of Lt. Stiles, the ship’s navigator – who is convinced that Spock must be working in some sort of cahoots with the enemy or at least harboring sympathy towards then. Kirk fiercely rebukes Lt. Stiles for his bigotry, which is a delicious moment, but one can tell that the navigator will not easily relinquish his feelings.
As for the balance of the episode, it is the riveting story of two equally skilled, experienced ship captains who are each trying to outwit the other. As with “The Corbomite Maneuver,” it feels like the Enterprise is in very real peril- and will be fortunate to escape with their lives. And like the feature film which inspired it, Jerry Sohl paints very sympathetic portraits of both commanders- to the point where by the end of the episode, we feel a genuine sadness for the vanquished Romulan commander, especially when (in a final message to the Enterprise) he expresses his admiration for Kirk even as he explains to him that as a person of duty, he has “one more duty to perform.” That act of duty is to destroy his own ship – a valiant act of sacrifice- rather than fall into the hands of the Federation.
There are many things I love about this episode, and one of them is something I also loved about “The Corbomite Maneuver” – that it vividly conveys the vastness of deep space and the sense that the Enterprise is very, very far from home…… unlike most episodes of the original show where the galaxy feels like a fairly cozy place where everything is in fairly close, comfortable proximity to everything else (which is patently absurd, given the actual immensity of our galaxy.) In this episode, the Enterprise is so far from home that it will take days for it to send a message to Starfleet Command and days for their reply to be received. In more ways than one, the Enterprise crew is on their own as they confront this frightening new threat.
And they perform admirably – as do the Romulans, but neither side is flawless. Mistakes and miscalculations are made by both sides, unlike so many such encounters in television or film where there is a sort of superhuman perfection to the proceedings. We are seeing warriors who are very able- yet also flawed … and courageous yet fearful … and it makes the encounter between them all the more compelling.
(In the above photo of the Romulan commander and his second-in-command, one can see an example of the ingenuity demonstrated by the technical team that had to create this show within the constraints of a tight budget – one which only tightened further as the show proceeded. Marc Cushman explains in the first volume of These are the Voyages that it would have been prohibitively expensive to have fashioned full make up- including those distinctive pointed ears- for all of the crew members of the Romulan ship. So the decision was made that most of the Romulans would wear helmets- beneath which the actors could sport their own human- looking ears. It was a simple yet brilliant solution. For the sake of cost controls, the Romulan vessel was also kept small and fairly cramped, which hearkens back to the Nazi submarine from The Enemy Below.)
We are also made privy to the quiet regrets of both commanders – who fear for the safety of their respective ship mates and who do not necessarily believe themselves to be fully capable of bearing the extraordinary responsibilities that they bear. And in both of them we see men who do not relish the waging of war and who are acutely aware of its cost. In the case of the Romulans, that cost is represented with the self destruction of their ship and the deaths of all aboard. The Enterprise emerges from the encounter having suffered only one death – but tragically, the crewman lost is Tomlinson, the young man who was about to be married as the episode began. The moment we hear that sad news is among the most haunting and poignant of the entire series.
So then, there are two themes which combine to give this episode its striking color and texture: First, we see the U.S.S. Enterprise engaged in warfare, in stark contrast to its more typical mission of discovery and exploration. Second, we see an example racism and bigotry (albeit an isolated case) against the backdrop of a time (the 23rd century) when, at least as Gene Roddenberry has conceived it, humankind has largely abandoned such foolishness. Thanks to the presence of Lt. Stiles, we see that such attitudes will probably never be entirely eradicated, much as we might wish them to be.
I also love the added touch of the wedding at the beginning of the episode- a reminder that these are real people aboard this ship. It’s touches of humanity like this that elevate Star Trek above the usual scientific fare of the time, which was pretty much focused on ray guns and space monsters. And for anyone who fails to understand the difference between Star Trek and another show of the time called Lost in Space, just watch “Balance of Terror.”