Decent episode, though, having already watched the pilot, the fact that this two-part episode was just a way to get some use out of that footage (you watch the entire thing; it's sort of an episode within an episode, explained away by saying that the inhabitants of the mentalist planet have taken over the viewscreens and are forcing them to see the whole story of what happened to Captain Pike on his first visit) for the broadcast run was a little annoying. There were maybe twenty minutes worth of new footage and new plot, out of the whole 100+ minutes.
All in all, though, it made for some entertaining television, showed Spock doing something that was against regulations which is important for his character development (even if he, possibly tongue-in-cheek, insists that he played it logically all along (a case could be made for that)), and gave some closure to the story of the one-off Captain-that-was.
Thinking too hard about it makes it kind of icky, though. For one thing, Captain Pike and chick-from-pilot, hereafter referred to as Vena because I'm not sure what her name was but I think that was close, both agreed in the pilot that she was too ugly to have any fun in the real world, so the mentalists gave her an illusory Captain Pike to pretend-populate-the-earth with.
Which is creepy in and of itself; I feel like a better course of action would have been for her to leave, and either get some plastic surgery, or just learn to live with being physically a little odd compared to the rest of the (human) chicks in the galaxy. Ugly bitches that DON'T crash-land on alien planets manage to get by in society - maybe they own a few more cats than is usual, but who wants to be usual?
But aside from that, which was already done, what happens now that the real Captain Pike is also on the planet? "Hey baby, now that I'm a disfigured parapalegic, you're good enough for me! Drop that zero-because-he's-imaginary and get with this used-to-be-a hero!" Or do they just never tell her, and live separate but equal lives of illusion? I feel like that wouldn't really work for the mentalists, because they'd like to have some human beings makin' with the fornication and giving them some human babies n' shit. So they're going to interact somehow.
Maybe it's a tightly maintained double-illusion, where she's kept thinking there's no change in her Pike while she unknowingly bangs his parapalegic, metal-entombed body, and he thinks she knows what's up and loves him for his mind? I feel like all of these outcomes are a.) relatively happy for the two people involved but b.) send a really bad message about, y'know, self-image, self-worth, truth, and acceptable compromise. Or maybe a really good one, I guess, depending on your moral stance. I don't think I'd consider any of them optimum, personally.
On the plus side, considering that the first episode began the annoying four or five episode run where every ep was about finding a powerful something, fearing it, and wanting to destroy it, this did at least wrap that up and turn it into a good thing, because they went to the 'villains' from episode one and ended up having them be saviors of a human or two.
Random stats: 2 episodes to show 1 episode of pre-taped content, 4 shots total because I watched the first half last night when I had to work early, and only started drinking for the second half, tonight, and [every time the black-haired chick was on the screen] times I was reminded of Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow.
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