Star Trek: The Animated Series Season 1, Episode 3: “One of Our Planets is Missing”

Synopsis: The Enterprise enters a cosmic cloud and discovers that it is alive.

What is interesting about this episode is how it tracks how the change of perception of the crew of the Enterprise affects how it responds to a threatening situation.

In the beginning of “One of Our Planets is Missing” the crew of the Enterprise experiences the cloud entity as potentially some sort of space weather – something that just exists. Then as it gets closer and engulfs and destroys a planet, the crew is alerted to the threat coming from the cloud. Their first instinct is to protect itself and planets inhabited by humans in its path. When the Enterprise itself is engulfed by the cloud entity, the crew discovers that it is alive and dangerous. The first impulse is to fight back, but the crew learns that the cloud entity only absorbs the energy of weapons. Thinking that they can prevent the destruction of a planet in the cloud entity’s path, Captain James T. Kirk orders that a self-destruct device be created, and that by sacrificing the Enterprise the planet may be saved. When Mr. Spock discovers that the cloud entity has a brain and is potentially intelligent, Kirk wants to target the brain to kill the cloud entity. Spock reminds Kirk that it is against Starfleet regulations to kill intelligent life and offers the suggestion that he try to communicate with the cloud entity through a mind meld. As it turns out, the cloud entity had no idea that it was killing intelligent lifeforms itself and Spock is able to convince it not to go to the planet. The Enterprise then leaves free to explore new unknown things in space.

This reflects how the conscious ego deals with a complex. Because a complex arises from a wound, the conscious ego’s first reaction is to protect itself against a perceived threat to its control. But then another option arises to try to make contact and work with what is causing the pain from the complex. By working to integrate the bit of unconscious contained in the complex with the conscious ego, the ego is then able to escape the serious pain from the complex and move on to explore other aspects of the psyche.

Original post created 7 April 2021