"The Tholian Web" wraps Emmy-nominated special effects around an excellent if unusual story. This episode probably represents the least time Kirk appears on his own ship, this on a bottle episode at that! With the Captain away however the rest of the crew has time to shine and they do. The scenes between Spock and McCoy as they handle the crisis in their own way, and vis-a-vis each other, is remarkable. (Check out the tension in their locked gaze as Spock logically fires on the Tholian ship.) Uhura and Scott also have precious moments of insight and development. Chekov gets several good screams plus a nerve pinch, and it's touching how gently George cradles Walter's head from the helm console after his bridge freak-out scene.

The plot dives right in with the murdered crew of the Defiant. The scenes aboard the sister ship are downright creepy (if somewhat blood-free) yet it's too bad we don't hear the log entries McCoy finds, made by the perishing crew. (Also, why the Exo III graphic and not the more appropriate Psi 2000?) The cold quiet engine room demonstrate literal and figurative death (even though through the interphase effect the Bussard collectors yet roll?). It's a shame funeral service omits mention of the hundreds of fellow Starfleet lives lost, though it's good to see such a service demands, like McCoy, the personal attention of a "crowded universe" of crewmembers.

Other elements redeem the effort too including the bright spacesuits donned by the away team (that were replaced by glowing Life Support Belts in TAS and somewhat evoked by the EVA suits in TMP). And McCoy fights! Or at least wrestles with a mad orderly, until Chapel has presence of mind to hypo him out. He performs his duty perfectly, including his (unique?) knowledge of the "final orders" and insisting that they be played. (Yet Spock knows the/a combination to Kirk's safe, beautifully exemplifying their reciprocity.)

It's clear Kirk senses something wrong before and after landing on Defiant. It's also clear he willfully sacrifices himself for the ship and crew just as McCoy says. The multiverse science of the interphase effect and the strange technology of the Web works (except for maybe the confusing release), what works better is the unabashed exhibition of the invisible, unbreakable web that bonds these characters. The "Enterprise" two-parter "In a Mirror Darkly" makes a highly palatable dessert to this episode. It's nice to see two series cooperating with each other as well as the regulars in the episode do.


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