Synopsis: On the planet Pyris VII the Enterprise encounters aliens from another galaxy.
It is interesting that this particular episode from Star Trek: The Original Series was never one of my favorites when I was growing up watching the reruns. After re-viewing it this time, I can understand why. “Catspaw” is all about aliens from another galaxy who are able to reach into our unconscious and use it as a weapon. As Mr. Spock observes: “As if someone knew what it was that most terrified man on an instinctual level.”
The episode starts as many do, with a landing party sent down to the surface of a planet, here Pyris VII, and encountering alien life on what was previously thought of as an uninhabited world. Here, one individual, Crewman Jackson, is beamed back to the ship, dead, and a voice from the Underworld calls out to Captain James T. Kirk: “There is a curse on your ship. Leave this place or you will all . . . die.” Naturally, Kirk’s conscious ego must go and investigate what happened to Jackson and to rescue Chief Engineer Montgomery Scott and Lt. Hikaru Sulu, who remain on the planet. Dr. Leonard (Bones) McCoy later remarks that Jackson was used as a catspaw, to get more crewmembers to come down to the planet.
When Kirk, Spock, and McCoy reach the planet fog appears and then three witches appear to tell them to remember the curse and to leave this place. Seemingly knowing that this will entice them to keep going. As it turns out, Spock correctly surmises that the aliens, Korob and Sylvia, are able to reach the unconscious aspect of the human psyche and reproduce those images for the landing party in the mistaken belief that this is human conscious reality. The fact that Spock calls the collective unconscious the “racial subconscious” reflects the shadow aspect of his own psyche – suppressing and devaluing his human half and his belief that he has no links to the human collective unconscious and its emotions. An aspect of his personality that he will be forced to contend with as the series and the films move forward in time.
That Korob and Sylvia can access only the unconscious is also explained in that they have no understanding of scientific methods. Spock surmises that this means that it is unlikely that they are from this galaxy. And indeed, they are not. But how fascinating, to coin a phrase, to have these representatives from another species that communicate through the collective unconscious rather than the ego consciousness. As Spock expresses, it is too bad that they could not survive in the surface world. To paraphrase the character Sylvia, think of the secrets we could have learned.
Original post created 12 February 2021
mydailysoultrek 