Assignment: Earth (TOS episode)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Star Trek: TOS episode | |
| "Assignment: Earth" | |
 Roberta and Agent Gary Seven, "Assignment: Earth" |
|
| Episode no. | 55 |
|---|---|
| Prod. code | 055 |
| Airdate | March 29, 1968 |
| Writer(s) | Gene Roddenberry Art Wallace |
| Director | Marc Daniels |
| Guest star(s) | Robert Lansing Teri Garr Don Keefer Morgan Jones Lincoln Demyan Paul Baxley Barbara Babcock Ted Gehring Bruce Mars Victoria Vetri |
| Year | 2268, 1968 |
| Stardate | unknown |
| Episode chronology | |
| Previous | "Bread and Circuses" |
| Next | "Spock's Brain" |
"Assignment: Earth" is a second season episode of Star Trek: The Original Series. It was first broadcast on March 29, 1968 as the last original episode in the second season. It was repeated on August 9, 1968. It is episode #55, production #55, written by Gene Roddenberry and Art Wallace, and directed by Marc Daniels.
There is no stardate given in this episode.
Overview: Time warping back to Earth of the 1960s, the crew of the Enterprise encounters an intergalactic superspy, who tries to interfere with 20th Century events.
[edit] Plot
Using a gravitational slingshot effect around the sun, the starship USS Enterprise time warps back to Earth of the 1960's for a historical research mission. The ship orbits Earth at an extreme distance to avoid detection by the tracking devices of the time. Suddenly, the Enterprise intercepts a highly powerful transporter beam originating from thousands of light-years away.
A being materializes on the transporter pad, who appears as a human dressed in a business suit. He carries a black cat with a diamond collar in one arm, and holds a briefcase with the other. He converses with his cat, Isis, then introduces himself to Captain Kirk as Gary Seven.
Seven informs Kirk that he is an Earth human, but from another, far more advanced world. He is one of a number of agents sworn to protect Earth, who are descended from humans who were taken into space over 6000 years ago. Seven refuses to divulge the location of his home planet and warns Kirk that Earth will be destroyed by an event in the near future if he is not released immediately.
Kirk demands more proof, but Seven says no more. Kirk tries to have him taken into custody, but Seven is able to resist attempts to subdue him, even shrugging off Spock's nerve pinch. When Seven tries to beam himself down to the planet, Kirk stuns him with a phaser.
Kirk has Seven carted away and asks Spock to search the historic database for any critical events that occur within the next few days. Spock finds that the United States will test launch a new rocket from a nuclear weapons platform at McKinley Rocket Base. The launch is scheduled to take place within a few hours and the event may be the key factor for Seven's arrival.
Meanwhile, Seven comes to, and finds himself in a holding cell. He withdraws a pen from his pocket and uses the gadget to short out the containment field and harmlessly disable the guard. The escape sets off alarms, but Seven, with his cat, easily make their way to the transporter room, disable the technicians, and beam down to their destination. Kirk and Spock have no choice but to follow them.
Seven makes his way to an office where he activates a sophisticated computer mounted in a wall. The computer reports that two other agents "201" and "347", assigned to stop the missile launch, have failed to report back for three days. With only an hour remaining until the launch, Seven decides to intercept the missile himself.
Just then, a pretty young girl arrives at Seven's office and he mistakes her for one of his missing agents. He asks her for a report of her activities, and she is quite dismayed to find that the electric typewriter types everything that she says. His computer then butts in and identifies her as Roberta Lincoln, the other agents' secretary.
Seven realizes his blunder in making Roberta aware of this and other devices. Seven has accidentally revealed critical information to her. Trying to fix things, Seven informs Roberta he secretly works for the government. Roberta, however, simply works for Seven's agents as a secretary, believing that they are compiling a new encyclopaedia. She is by no means unintelligent and quickly realizes that something extremely odd is afoot. The Beta-5 computer in the office then informs Seven that his people have died in a car accident.
Kirk and Spock arrive at Seven's office, dressed in mid-20th Century clothing, and Seven has Roberta stall them while he goes to his giant walk-in safe. The vault really contains a secret transporter. As Kirk tries to phaser his way through the door, Seven walks into a blue mist and arrives at the base. He uses a fake base ID to gain access to the rocket control room and "freezes" anyone who tries to stop him. Climbing out onto the launch gantry (and accompanied by Isis), he soon locates a circuit panel and begins to rewire the rocket's systems.
Kirk and Spock return to the Enterprise to try and locate Seven, meanwhile Roberta noses around Seven's office and starts to play with the controls of the transporter. Back in space, Mr. Scott finds the location of Gary Seven, and Kirk orders him to beam Seven up. At the same time, Roberta activates the transporter and beams Seven back to his office.
Seven is briefly furious, then realizes that because of her curiousity, his more-powerful unit had snatched him away from the Enterprise transporter in mid-beam. He quickly checks his computer, which informs him that he can still control the rocket after launch, even though he hadn't finished his work. Seven then begins sending commands to the missile which has taken off as Roberta phones the police. Seven turns and destroys the phone with his gadget pen, but Roberta later manages to overcome him. She points the pen at him and threatens to zap him if he doesn't surrender. Seven tries to explain that he has no time for games and that the missile is headed to its target.
Meanwhile at the launch site, Kirk and Spock are caught by base security, but Scotty beams them away before they are arrested, and returns them to Seven's office. Kirk takes the gadget pen away from Roberta and confronts Seven who explains his plan to Kirk. He informs them that he can destroy the missile at a safe distance and Kirk allows him to proceed. Spock confirms this to be the correct decision as recorded in the history database.
While the three men discuss what has happened, Roberta notices Isis has morphed into a sexy woman in a leather cat suit. When she demands an explanation from Seven, he patiently replies "That, Miss Lincoln, is simply my cat." When Roberta looks again, all she sees is, in fact, a cat. Seven decides to keep the mischievous Roberta "employed" as his assistant for any future missions.
[edit] Trivia
- This episode served double duty, not only as an episode of Star Trek, but as a pilot for a proposed spin-off television series, that would have been produced by Roddenberry, under the same name, Assignment: Earth. The show would feature actor Robert Lansing as Gary Seven, a futuristic "James Bond", as the lead character. The episode stars Teri Garr as Roberta Lincoln, who would have been a co-star in the series, had it continued on its own.
- This is the only episode of Star Trek in which time travel is treated as "routine", utilizing the solar "slingshot" time warp effect first seen in The Original Series episode "Tomorrow Is Yesterday" and in the motion picture, Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.
- In a novel by Greg Cox, Gary Seven and Roberta Lincoln go on to eventually stop Khan Noonien Singh and his fellow genetically engineered humans from taking over the planet.
- The address of Gary Seven's office (811 East 68th Street, New York City) would actually fall in the middle of the East River, as that street ends at the waterfront in the 500s. Not only that, but the address of the Ricardos and owned by the Mertzs on "I Love Lucy" (another Desilu production) was 643 East 68th Street, only 2 blocks closer to shore.
- This episode has a strange double coincidence with real-life events. Spock mentions that the same day the US is launching an orbital nuclear warhead platform there will also be an important assassination. The missile shown in the episode is actually stock footage of the launch of Apollo 4, the first unmanned test of a Saturn V. Less than a week after the episode's first airing Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated the same day as the launch of Apollo 6, the second unmanned test of a Saturn V. Spock's other "prediction" of a government coup in Asia did not happen that day.
[edit] External links
- Assignment: Earth at StarTrek.com
- "Assignment: Earth" article at Memory Alpha, a Star Trek wiki.
| Last produced: " The Omega Glory " |
Star Trek: TOS episodes Season 2 |
Next produced: " Spectre of the Gun " |
| Last transmitted: " Bread and Circuses " |
Next transmitted: " Spock's Brain " |
