This episode is very action oriented. It's a redo of what was a throw-away concept in the first season episode, "The Lonely Among Us." In that episode I'd complained that they weren't taking the backdrop story of planets petitioning to be a part of the Federation seriously. This episode pushes substance over the annoying silliness that was so prolific in the first season. Although it's a refreshing improvement, it's still not the best one with this basic story line from the series. But it's another good episode.
The lucky man who went on to play Zephram Cockran in First Contact plays the leader, Nayrok, of the Angosians who are petitioning to become Federation members. They've survived a terrible war and have rebuilt on peace and pacifism. Everything the progressive and utopic Federation likes to hear.
But while they're all getting to know each other a prisoner escapes in a transport shuttle from an orbiting asteroid which Nayrok first describes as a penal colony. They ask the Enterprise for help since they feel unable to deal with it. So naturally the Enterprise helps out. The prisoner ends up loose on the ship and it takes a good deal of time and several men to catch him.
His name is Roga Danar and this should be a cut and dried case of capture and recovery, but of course, it's not. The crew of Star Trek can never resist a mystery and when they discover that he has no life signs, they start to investigate. They discover he was psychologically conditioned and biochemically altered to become the perfect soldier for the war that they'd won. Because of the conditioning he and other soldiers received, they had a hard time reintegrating into civilized society after the war. This is more of Star Trek reaching back to its beginnings in the 60's to try to sure up its roots in attempt to move forward in the 80's and it's not a bad thing - this episode just didn't have as much to build on like the previous one did so it was more of a one-off blip on the screen. Still, it's a better way to throw stuff against the wall to see what sticks than the previous methods. This episode is an allegory for the way Vietnam Vets were treated after returning to America. Of course the part they leave out is that it was the liberal, progressive hippies like Jane Fonda who not only sabotaged them while they were over there but also treated them with contempt and called them baby killers and ostracized them from decent society on their return, not patriotic people who supported aiding other countries to fight for real freedom. But the circumstances in this situation are sufficiently different that the smugness of the liberal protagonist position of the Federation isn't too offensive. It's actually a good story.
In this case the government really is to blame because of the scientific tampering of their people. Nayrok and other government officials have to admit that the Lunar V base is not a penal colony but a place to relocate these soldiers because the modifications made to their bodies and minds made it impossible for them to assimilate back into normal culture without becoming criminals. It's also determined that the damage could've been undone but that they'd never been serious about trying to undo it. All of this is making the Angosian bid for Federation acceptance less and less palatable. And I do appreciate this episode as better example of how to write about people whose internal problems that are a hindrance to their application in comparison with "The Lonely Among Us" which played the two races off very comically and absurdly.
However, this episode verges on the absurd as well. But, not because of the concept of the super soldier. In the attempt to send Danar back to the Angosians he escapes and tears around loose on the ship again. I actually like this stuff. He single handedly takes out a lot of people in a non lethal manner and then organizes a mass break out from Lunar V. (As an aside, this is the first time the Jeffries Tubes get named and this is the only one where they have one big enough to stand up in also.)
But where it starts to trail away from credibility for me is the way they leave the Angosian government to deal with it at the end without any desire to help. It would seem that they've made the assumption that the Angosians have brought it on themselves and therefore need to be left to deal with it alone (using the Prime Directive as an excuse) in what is a very irresponsible situation - even if the Angosians decided to give concessions to the former soldiers, there's still a very good chance that the situation would escalate into chaos in a hurry due to the temperament of the soldiers. It's just a little too soon after The Vengeance Factor where the Enterprise bends over backwards to help a people reintegrate, not sick and lonely war veterans, but actual criminals and thugs back into the host society, holding their hands through the entire process. This is the smugness of progressivism surfacing a little.
It doesn't detract much from the episode though. Roga Danar is a believable character and even though I take notice of that smugness, I can also see the appeal in this solution. I liked it. But when you try to simplify politics, there end up being a lot of holes. Three and a half stars
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