the m0vie blog

This July and August, we’re celebrating the release of Star Trek Beyond by taking a look back at the third season of the original Star Trek. Check back every Monday, Wednesday and Friday for the latest update.

The Lights of Zetar is another third season ghost story.

The third season of Star Trek is populated with these weird stories about long-dead souls refusing to pass on. There is Kirk’s haunting of the Enterprise in The Tholian Web, the dead world of Scalos in Wink of an Eye, the replicas of the long-dead Losira in That Which Survives, the title character in Requiem for Methuselah, the escapes into the past in All Our Yesterdays. It is almost as though the third season is working through its anxieties, a season television trapped between two cancellations.

The Light of Zetar features yet more death and destruction. The mangled bodies inside the Memory Alpha facility, contorted over the furniture. The lone survivor, screaming in agony. The eponymous spectral apparition that “cannot be a phenomenon of nature.” The inhabitants of Zetar, rendered non-corporeal through the destruction of their world, refusing to acknowledge that they have truly been dead for thousands upon thousands years. The argument that Mira Romaine must sacrifice herself so that the Zetar might live.

More than a ghost story, The Lights of Zetar is an exorcism story.

The Lights of Zetar is notable for a number of reasons. Perhaps most striking is the creative team. The Lights of Zetar is credited to writers Jeremy Tarcher and Sheri Lewis. Lewis is very much the headline name here, as much a special guest writer as Harlan Ellison on The City on the Edge of Forever or Richard Matheson on The Enemy Within. Sheri Lewis is particularly notable as the creator of Lamb Chop, the beloved children’s entertainment figure that left quite a large mark on popular culture.

Lewis is also notable for being one of several women writers to work on the third season, with producer Fred Freiberger working very hard to encourage and engage with female writers on the show. Indeed, it could legitimately be argued that the much larger volume of female writers on the third season of Star Trek contributed to the season’s unique feel and perspective. The third season of Star Trek is often maligned, but the show is more experimental than it had been before. Episodes like Is There in Truth No Beauty?, The Empath and The Tholian Web are testament.

As Shari Lewis explained to Starlog, the episode had a rather strange development life-cycle:

“I spoke to Freddy Freiberger [the third  season’s producer], who immediately gave me an appointment,” Lewis recalls. “I went in, and we described the story. He said, ‘I love it, but it’s too close to something we have coming down the pike. A writer is working on something similar.’

“He said, ‘But, do come up with another one, particularly one that has some comedy to it. We’re not doing enough comedy!’ I  went home and told my husband, so then we  came up with another one. When I went into the meeting with the second story, they said, “Oh, the first story didn’t work out. We want to buy yours!’ They bought my first story after all.”

Ultimately, the “something similar” never materialised, and the result is one of the weirder episodes of Star Trek ever produced.

It is also worth noting that Fred Freiberger was looking to do a comedy episode. One of the more frequent criticisms of Fred Freiberger as producer on the third season was his ambivalence to comedy on the show. This pointed criticism comes from writer David Gerrold, who pitched a couple of ideas for comedy episodes in the third season that were rejected; they were subsequently developed for Star Trek: The Animated Series as More Tribbles, More Troubles and Bem.

It seems highly likely that Freiberger’s reluctance to commit to comedy episodes early in the season was a gesture of deference towards Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry. Although Roddenberry was no longer working on the show, he was a source of input and advice for Freiberger early in the third season. After all, Roddenberry had been a very vocal champion of episodes like Elaan of Troyius or The Paradise Syndrome. More than that, Freiberger was consciously trying to be respectful of the show that he inherited, and that meant being respectful of its creator.

During the second season, Roddenberry had objected loudly and repeatedly to an increased emphasis on comedy in episodes like I, Mudd, The Trouble with Tribbles and A Piece of the Action. Roddenberry seemed to think that second season producer Gene L. Coon was introducing too much levity into the series, and undercutting the credibility of Star Trek as a science-fiction show. It doesn’t matter than these three episodes were infinitely stronger than The Omega Glory or Assignment: Earth. Roddenberry did not want comedy in Star Trek.

However, Roddenberry had grown increasingly distant over the course of the third season, and Freiberger was increasingly left to his own devices. While Roddenberry would return to script The Savage Curtain and Turnabout Intruder, Freiberger was largely free to chart his own course over the final third of the season. After all, if Gene Roddenberry had objected to the inclusion of comedy in Star Trek, it seems highly unlikely that he would have encouraged contributions from a writer largely seen as a children’s entertainer.

Indeed, Lewis’ involvement in both Lamb Chop and The Lights of Zetar would prove frustrating to a certain brand of Star Trek purist. Fred Freiberger was still being asked to justify asking her to write for the show to Starlog in the eighties:

Speaking of “The Lights of Zetar,” why was Shari Lewis, an actress, given the assignment?

Shari came to us with The Light of Zetar. Her husband worked with her. Now, that story in any other show would have been cut off like seven different times. We kept working with her more than anybody else, and finally got a script.

But why give her the advantage over a more qualified writer?

Because she came with a lovely concept; a life form that was lights. Why wouldn’t I do that? Anyway, Shari wanted to be cast in the lead female role! I eventually cast Jan Shutan.

Note how the interviewer presses the question. It should be noted that the interviewer never asked why The Mark of Gideon was assigned to an actor, Stanley Adams, who had appeared in The Trouble with Tribbles. After all, Adams had never created either his own show or a beloved public persona.

Indeed, The Lights of Zetar hits upon themes and ideas that feel very personal to Shari Lewis. Looking at the episode, it is tempting to frame it in terms of her own experiences. After all, Lewis had originally wanted to play the role of Mira Romaine, although the part eventually went to Jan Shutan. As such, there is something appealing about reading some of Lewis into the character of Romaine. Naturally, such a reading is highly reductive and the script was heavily revised internally, but there is some weight to the idea.

Over the course of The Lights of Zetar, Mira Romaine is repeatedly denied her own voice. Indeed, the eponymous spectral phenomenon is plotting to use Romaine as a puppet. When the entity attacks the Enterprise at the start of the episode, it affects various crewmembers in different ways. It controls Sulu’s arms and paralyses Chekov’s gaze, but it takes Romaine’s voice. When Scotty and Kirk rush to Romaine, they find the young officer making strange (and impossible) sounds. Later in the episodes, the Zetar speak to Kirk through Romaine.

When Starlog asked Lewis about her inspirations in writing the episode, she spoke in similar terms, as if the idea just came through her:

One wonders where the story’s exorcist theme came from. “There are two kinds of  writers,” she states. “Those who are  conscious of what they’re writing and others who write what wells up. This particular story just occurred to us. I didn’t think of it  in those terms.”

Unlike the politics that drove Adams and Slavin to write The Mark of Gideon, it seems like The Lights of Zetar is more personal.

It is very difficult to talk about Shari Lewis without discussing Lamb Chop. The sassy sheep had been with Lewis for a long time; she was a part of Lewis’ first pilot for Desilu, providing a convenient historical overlap with the Star Trek franchise even before Lewis pitched an episode for the show. Lamb Chop first came to attention as part of the ensemble on The Shari Lewis Show. A variety show built around Lewis’ talents as a ventriloquist, Lamb Chop was very much the breakout star.

Indeed, the puppet soon took on a life of its own. Much like Star Trek itself, cancellation was little more than an inconvenience for Lamb Chop. The hand puppet would not remain dead for long. Shari Lewis came back to national attention in 1992 with an entire series built around the character, Lamb Chop’s Play-Along on PBS. The show become an essential childhood memory for an entire generation of children and Shari Lewis would go on to win five consecutive Emmy Awards for her work on the series.

In her final years, Lewis was very candid about the relationship that existed between herself and Lamb Chop, particularly during the difficult days following the cancellation of The Shari Lewis Show:

What has been the most difficult time in your career?

Well, in ’63 all of children’s programming turned to animation. All of it. I was very fortunate that I had long-term contracts with The Sahara in Las Vegas and Lake Tahoe. So, although it was extremely difficult to know that my entire field had crashed around my ears, it was very interesting to move into the casinos. I opened for Jack Benny and Donald O’Conner and many other wonderful stars.

It was also devastating. I went to Great Britain in that same period and did 18 shows a year for BBC. In order to do my children’s work, I had to leave the country…it was very saddening. The only bout with depression that I’ve ever had was at that period.

What was your most unusual experience with Lamb Chop?

Lamb Chop is so much my alter ego that she sometimes gets out of hand and says things I wouldn’t even dare think to myself. When she first met Desi Arnaz, he was sitting with his feet up on the table and was rather rude. She told him so in no uncertain terms. And that was the first time I really had to stay aware of what she was going to say, because she speaks for herself.

Have you ever used Lamb Chop in a personal situation to deal with a challenge or win an argument?

No, no, no. When my first network show was canceled in ’63, that was the only time I ever went to Lamb Chop and cried with her. But it hasn’t happened since.

It is a fascinating dynamic between creator and creation, a demonstration of how certain concepts and ideas can take on a life people the material. It seems like perfect fodder for a Star Trek episode.

These kinds of anecdotes have amassed into an entire mythology about the relationship between Lewis and her puppet. Matt Weinstock offered a summary of the popular perception of this dynamic:

A small mountain of lore has accumulated on the subject of Lewis’s connection with Lamb Chop—it’s been suggested that she smuggled the puppet along on her honeymoon and that she insisted producers flying her places purchase a seat on the plane for Lamb Chop—but it’s hard to tell how much of it’s apocryphal. Lewis herself confessed that after The Shari Lewis Show was cancelled in 1963, she “went to Lamb Chop and cried with her. But it hasn’t happened since.” Even once seems like a lot, though, and Lamb Chop’s Play-Along often seems to be referring to that moment of demented codependency, presenting situation after situation in which Lamb Chop is jonesing to get away from Lewis.

As such, it seems fair to frame The Lights of Zetar in terms of this relationship. It is a story about a woman who finds herself being used as a puppet by something else, having others speak through her and for her.

It should be noted that the eponymous lights are not the only entities that aim to speak for or through Romaine. Repeatedly over the course of the episode, the male characters seem to talk around or over Romaine, denying her agency or authority. This is most apparent in her relationship with Scotty, which is presented in a manner that is rather awkward. “I didn’t think Mister Scott would go for the brainy type,” Chekov observes. Sulu responds, pithily, “I don’t think he’s even noticed she has a brain.”

When Romaine is attacked by the lights, Kirk orders her to go to Sick Bay. However, Scotty repeats that order to Romaine in the most condescending manner possible. “Now you just do what Doctor McCoy ordered.” Indeed, by virtue of his relationship with Romaine, Scotty repeatedly presumes to speak on her behalf as a sort of translator. In Sick Bay, Scotty addresses her like a child, “Come on now, Mira. We must help the doctor. Tell us what happened.” It almost sounds like Scotty is going to offer her a lollypop at the end.

Indeed, Scotty quite patronisingly refuses to believe anything she says about having strange visions or feeling a connection to the entity, despite the fact that she collapsed on the bridge when confronted with it. Given Scotty’s own encounters with weird space phenomena in episodes like Wolf in the Fold or The Changeling, his skepticism seems a little absurd. Nevertheless, Scotty continually downplays Romaine’s concerns. He assures her it is “strange tricks [that] a space trip can play on [her] mind” and “pure bunk.”

Towards the climax of the episode, Romaine finds herself drawn into the briefing room for a meeting with Kirk, Spock and McCoy. The characters proceed to talk at length around her. “Now this is how we’ll proceed,” Kirk tells her. “Mister Spock has all the information available to us about our attackers. Doctor McCoy has access to Starfleet’s exhaustive files on you. A comparison of the two may turn up some improbable connection which may protect you and ourselves. All right, gentlemen? Doctor McCoy, will you proceed?”

Indeed, The Lights of Zetar ultimately concludes with the crew showing Romaine inside a pressure chamber and turning up the pressure past the point that a human body should be able to withstand. “Jim, you realize the pressure needed to kill the Zetars might kill the girl too,” McCoy informs Kirk. “The pressure is dangerously high, Captain. It may damage her.” It is a very powerful climax, particularly coming from a writer who had acknowledged struggling with depression following the cancellation of her high-profile television show. Sharri Lewis understands pressure.

Still, as interesting as these elements are, there is something quite frustrating about them. It is often quite difficult to tell when Star Trek is calling out sexism, and when it is indulging it. Indeed, based on episodes like Elaan of Troyius, The Paradise Syndrome and The Enterprise Incident, it is hard to tell when the Star Trek production team is calling out sexism and when they are casually indulging in it. The crew’s dismissive attitude towards Romaine might be a criticism of the way that professional women are treated… or it might be background noise.

After all, The Lights of Zetar was heavily reworked by producer Fred Freiberger and script editor Arthur Singer. Indeed, Lewis herself was somewhat ambivalent about the finished product:

Her feelings on the episode overall are mixed. “I found working with Mr. Freiberger wonderful, but the story editor did things to our story that didn’t make me enormously happy. The script as it exists is, I think, less good than as we wrote it. I also wasn’t happy with the female lead.”

To be entirely fair to Freiberger and Singer, Lewis was quite candid about wanting to play the role of Romaine, so she has something of a vested interest in that criticism. At the same time, there is some merit to her observations.

Romaine does not feel like a fully-formed and three-dimensional character, which make it hard to root for her. Part of this is down to the fact that Romaine is largely passive while most of the episode happens around her, and part of this is down to the fact that the script does little to imbue her with a sense of personality. Romaine lacks the kind of dynamism that makes other third season guest stars like the Romulan Commander or Deela so interesting to watch. Some of that is down to Jan Shutan.

There is also the fact that the episode offers little characterisation of Romaine beyond “Scotty’s girlfriend.” There are suggestions of more, of course; Romaine is independent and assertive in her early conversation with Doctor McCoy, she is apparently a top expert in her field having landed a sweet assignment on Memory Alpha. However, the episode is primarily interested in Romaine through her relationship with Scotty. In fact, Kirk’s opening log entry waxes lyrical about how magical their relationship is.

This is something of a stock criticism of the episode, to the point that Freiberger found himself defending the decision in an interview with Starlog:

But why is Scotty out of character? Can’t a guy be in love and still love his machines? Can’t he be with a woman who’s so attractive, he’s gonna fall in love? We wanted to do a love story and we said, “Hey, let’s give Scotty a break.”

You know, everyone on the show wanted more stuff. Chekov would come up. He wanted more. Sulu wanted more. Uhura would want more. Of course, they’re actors… why not? But its difficult when you’re doing a show. To keep McCoy and Kirk and Spock involved enough with the other people was tough enough. To keep the other actors happy, we would try to give them meaningful things to do. The characters were good, but you can’t always do it. Sometimes you hurt the story flow.

In many ways, the emphasis on the relationship between Scotty and Romaine speaks to Freiberger’s tastes as an executive producer.

The third season of Star Trek is not an ensemble by any stretch of the imagination. The focus is still very much on Kirk and Spock as the lead characters. However, there is also a willingness to focus on the supporting cast and to give the smaller players their own little moments of characterisation and development. Spectre of the Gun devotes considerable time to Chekov, separate from the rest of the team. For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky heavily leans on McCoy as a character. The Way to Eden… was almost a character script for McCoy.

However, it is telling how Freiberger decided to put an emphasis on these characters. For Freiberger, it seemed like character focus meant romance. Chekov’s small character beats in Spectre of the Gun hinge on his romance with an imaginary lady. McCoy gets a terminal diagnosis in For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky, and responds by falling in love and getting married. The Enterprise Incident emphasises a romance between Spock and the Romulan Commander. Love is very much in the air this season.

In interviews, Freiberger explained this shift in emphasis as part of a conscious attempt to attract new viewers to the series. After all, Star Trek was broadcasting in the graveyard slot of late Friday evening, at a point when most of its established younger audience was in bed. If the series was going to survive, Freiberger reasoned, it needed to attract a new and different kind of viewer:

Our problem was to broaden the viewer base. To do a science fiction show, but get enough additional viewers to keep the series on the air. I tried to do stories that had a more conventional story line within the science fiction frame.

It is certainly a laudable goal for a dying series. It should also be noted that Star Trek fandom (like most genre fandoms) has a history of being openly hostile to attempts to popularise the franchise; just look at the reactions to Star Trek and Star Trek Into Darkness. Still, there was something a little off about Freiberger’s attempts to make the series more accessible.

In many ways, Freiberger was more of a veteran television producer than a Star Trek visionary. His interviews tend to suggest a very conventional understanding of television production and audience appeal. Most notably, there is Freiberger’s repeated assertion that his emphasis on romance was necessary to attract female viewers to the series, hinging on the crass generalisation that women like romance and do not appreciate science-fiction. That is why Kirk fell in love in Elaan of Troyius and The Paradise Syndrome.

While there was undoubtedly demographic evidence to support Freiberger’s logic, the execution feels patronising and condescending. The hypothetical female viewer described by Freiberger in these discussions (who like romance but hates space) seems very unlikely to tune in for a romantic story set in space. Nobody was every going to watch Star Trek on a Friday night because there was some added romance. Those viewers who objected to science-fiction on principle were highly unlikely to be “tricked” by advertisements of Kirk kissing a lady.

In many ways, the romance between Scotty and Romaine feels just as condescending and patronising. The Lights of Zetar opens with Scotty and Romaine already in love. The episode never explains why the two characters are attracted to one another or what they see in each other. The audience never gets to see them spend any time together beyond dealing with the threat of the week. Even at the end of the episode, the audience does not get to see what happens to Romaine. She is simply gone by the start of The Cloud Minders.

It makes Romaine feel like another disposable woman in a third season full of disposable women. Miramanee and her unborn child were killed off at the end of The Paradise Syndrome so that Kirk could be back in command of the Enterprise for the start of The Enterprise Incident. McCoy apparently left Yonada at the end of For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky without even informing Natrina that he had been cured of his terminal illness, but at least he does break up with her.

Romaine… just disappears. After all, it is not as though her job is still waiting for her on Memory Alpha. It seems highly unlikely that the Federation would casually reopen what is effectively the site of a mass murder. However, The Lights of Zetar does not explain whether Romaine will remain on the Enterprise or travel back to Earth. It does not explain what will happen to her relationship with Scotty, despite the episode’s strained insistence that the two really truly love one another. She is just never heard from again.

To be fair, The Lights of Zetar was broadcast at a point in time where television was largely episodic. Within that framework, the “love affair of the week” is an expected trope. After all, Kirk was able to hook up freely and easily with Deela in Wink of an Eye and Odana in The Mark of Gideon. Even Spock got to have a flirtation with the Romulan Commander in The Enterprise Incident. However, those episodes took care to actually write the love interests out of the episode in the final act, albeit to varying degrees of success.

There is something frustrating about how little agency or development that The Lights of Zetar affords Romaine. Instead of actually developing her, providing an arc with a clear beginning and end, Romaine is instead treated as a plot device so inessential that she can be dealt with off-screen in the gap between The Lights of Zetar and The Cloud Minders. For all that Scotty claims to love her, he never mentions her again. Romaine would have to rely on non-canon sources like Memory Prime or Debt of Honour for closure.

Still, despite these significant issues, there is something intriguing about The Lights of Zetar. As with so many late third season episodes, The Lights of Zetar is more interesting than it is good. In particular, there is something quite interesting about the decision to effective structure the episode as a ghost story in space. To be fair, the first season of Star Trek was never as rational as most fans would argue, but the third season of Star Trek repeatedly hints and references the paranormal and the irrational, as if the universe itself is coming undone.

The eponymous entity is revealed to be the non-corporeal form of a long-dead civilisation, continuing the theme of genocide and extermination that runs through the third season. There is a sense that the entity might get along well with the lost relic of a dead civilisation in That Which Survives, the soon-to-be-extinct-turned-fair-folk Scalosians in Wink of an Eye, or the death-seeking Gideons in The Mark of Gideon. They could visit the ruins of Cheron from Let That Be Your Last Battlefield.

Zetar was destroyed “long ago.” When Kirk demands that the entity identify itself, it states that it is “the desires, the hopes, the mind and the will of the last hundred of Zetar. The force of our life could not be wiped out.” The Zetar are just too stubborn to die, unwilling to realise that they are extinct. Refusing to accept an inevitable death, the Zetar mirror other third season guest aliens; the defense system in That Which Survives or Bele and Lokai from Let That Be Your Last Battlefield.

In a way, it also reflects the show itself, fighting an inevitable cancellation. NBC had cancelled Star Trek at the end of its second season, but the show had refused to stay dead. Even with the third season commissioned, the series was constantly under threat. The Lights of Zetar was one of two episodes commissioned as part of a mid-season interim pick-up, with the possibility of the final six episodes still up in the air as the episode was written. Star Trek understands Kirk when he assures the Zetar that “all things die.”

The Zetar are ghosts. As such, The Lights of Zetar is an exorcism story. The malevolent entity speaks through Romaine in a manner similar to the demons from other exorcism stories. It lays claim to her body. “She cannot stop us. You cannot prevent it.” It is a set-up common to these sorts of stories, from The Exorcist through to The Conjuring II. The episode is quite overt in acknowledging the tropes and conventions of this kind of story, even if it does work hard to place them within the show’s existing science-fiction framework.

When the Zetar first take control of Romaine, Kirk demands that they name themselves, one of the most common devices when dealing with demons. “Who are you?” he insists. When they evade, he presses the point, “Then what are you?” When the Zetar speak through Romaine, their voice is deepened as if to underscore the supernatural element of what is occurring. In fact, when she is first struck down, she makes some unnatural noises that sound almost like she is speaking in tongues. “What’s that you’re sayin’?” Scotty inquires.

Indeed, when Kirk is trying figure out why Romaine has been targeted, he turns to her teenage years. “Any history of psychosomatic illness?” Kirk asks. McCoy responds, “Occasional and teenage routine incidents.” Kirk follows up, “Any evidence of involuntary or unconscious telepathic abilities?” McCoy answers, “None.” It fits quite comfortably with the school of paranormal thought that suggests poltergeists are simply the expression of teenage extra-sensory perception.

Indeed, the episode constantly and repeatedly zooms in on Romaine’s eye, as if to offer the viewer a window to her soul. The episode was directed by Herb Kenwith, a director with over a decade of experience but who was new to science-fiction. He explained his approach to the episode to Starlog:

“There was an effect I really wanted that they couldn’t do at the time. The girl — Jan Shutan, a lovely actress — has things happening to her brain, I believe. I wanted to do a thing where the lens would go right into  the pupil of her eye, then go into her brain to  see the images, but we couldn’t do it. I said,  ‘Let’s do it backwards; let’s start real close on the eye, then pull back, and we’ll reverse the film.” It would be as though we were dollying in, but we couldn’t do that! Of course, today, they can do all those things.

“Aside from that, this wasn’t an occasion for many directing tricks. I requested certain things about colors for the outer world people. I didn’t do anything with the girl’s face turning green or the distorted speech,” he  states. “I guess they spared me! We worked on the spaceship set with them whirling around on chairs and looking at the screen.”

As with other directors who worked on the third season, like Marc Daniels on Spock’s Brain or Ralph Senensky on The Tholian Web or John Erman on The Empath, there was a sense that the director was largely working a conveyor belt system designed to complete an episode on time and on budget. To a large extent, that was true of all television at the time; but it was particularly true on the third season.

The Lights of Zetar is an odd episode of Star Trek. It is uneven and flawed, but it fits quite well with the larger season as a whole. There is something endearing about the unique tone of the third season of Star Trek. A space exorcism story is just weird enough to work in that context. It is a messy and clumsy piece of television that struggles to define its central character, and which considers a romance of the week to count as characterisation for Scotty. Nevertheless, there is something very charming in its dysfunction.

Filed under: The Original Series | Tagged: Ghost story, lamb chop, mira romaine, Scotty, shari lewis, star trek, the lights of zetar |