Customer Reviews

Star Trek - The Original Series, Episode 20: The Alternative Factor [VHS]

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I find the other reviews here...amusing, as Spock might say. I just got through watching this episode and was spellbound. First of all, I might agree...there was less of note here to hook my memory around, so although I have watched the series several times in reruns, this episode appeared somewhat new to me. In flavor, it almost reminded me a bit more of the Outer Limits (classic) than Star Trek, but really, I found it was Star Trek at some of its best. Best because it did not cheat the science...it struggled with it. You could see Kirk and Lazarus groping with the concepts of parallel universes. And so they should! These ideas have just recently entered mainstream physics and popular science (not just science fiction). This episode was not the be all and end all, but offered a plausible scenario and set of circumstances within an explanation...but no, there was no boisterous "oh, aha, that's what a parallel universe is...".

So, I liked this episode because it showed a brainier side of Kirk for one, in which Spock was bit more aggressive (wanting to destroy Lazarus, perhaps he had been around humans too long(!)) and Kirk was trying -- in a very energetic way -- to wrap his mind around the concepts, the paradoxes!

This episode really spoke not just to the "Trekkies" who came much later after the series was aired, but to the sci-fi buffs...the original fans, who were there not just for the music, the crew women in miniskirts, the characters and the fights (all good reasons) but for the introduction of science concepts that challenged and expanded our mental horizons. There was no www or http in 1967 for me to look up parallel universes, but I thank Mr. Roddenberry for putting the concept on the television so I could watch it in Queens and have this knowledge...even if not complete...

The concept here is good; it is the execution that is a complete failure. The episode explores some interesting ideas about madness, duality, parallel universes, altruism, and sacrifice. That's all good stuff, so where can it go wrong?

The plot, screenplay, effects, and direction are all a complete mess. Where to start?

- Kirk (and independently, Star Fleet Command) conclude on the basis of one strange phenomenon that it is a "prelude to invasion". What? Where did THAT come from?

- The phenomenon has universe-wide implications and threatens to destroy all existence, everywhere. Yet, Star Fleet Command inexplicably decides to evacuate 100% of their resources and leave the fate of the universe in the hands of one ship. Also, if all existence is threatened, then clearly invasion is not the issue, unless the invaders are suicidal.

- I had to watch this multiple times in order to determine which Lazarus was on screen at any given time, and which was the sane one and which the insane one. I'm still not entirely sure in all cases. Sometimes the switch happens with no special effects.

- Lazarus is allowed to wander around the ship without a guard even though he seems quite crazy, and he has threatened to steal the dilithium crystals. The crystals are not guarded even though two have already been stolen and Lazarus has openly threatened to take the others. The ship can't function without the crystals. For that matter it has already been stated that the existence of the entire universe is at stake, and Lazarus is clearly the key to the puzzle (and a proven liar), yet he wanders about the ship unattended and, surprise, surprise, easily flips a jumper switch to sabotage the engineering room.

- The insane Lazarus "saves" Kirk's life, which I guess is to show he is insane rather than evil, however it only adds to the confusion about which is which. Not a good idea for a plot that cries out for some clarity.

- Spock and Kirk realize there are two versions of Lazarus, even though they have only seen one of them. Spock mentions the disappearance then reappearance of the bandage though neither he nor Kirk witnessed it, and Kirk had dismissed McCoy's story. Off screen, McCoy briefly saw the sane Lazarus, and he appeared briefly in a rec room and in Engineering to steal dilithium crystals. Otherwise he was never seen by anyone until Kirk meets up with him in the other universe.

- The science is nonsensical, which is ok up to a point, this being fiction. But all the babble about matter and antimatter is just utter nonsense and hard to ignore. It's true that matter and antimatter "cancel each other out violently", but the destruction of the entire universe is silly. Well, that's ok for fiction. But how is it possible for the antimatter Lazarus to walk around the Enterprise without any destruction? They try to explain this away that the antimatter and matter must be identical, which is already silly. But, hey, sane and insane Lazarus are not identical. Their behavior is different, for one thing, and one is sporting a gash in his head that the other is missing.

- Lazarus has a space ship that does not move through space. He calls it a time machine but it does not move through time.

- How does Lazarus manager to live on a desert planet totally devoid of life? Doesn't the man need to eat?

- Lazarus needs dilithium crystals to move into the corridor and to get to the other universe, yet without having the crystals, or his portal/ship, he moves freely back and forth at least a half dozen times.

- Sometimes when Lazarus hops into the corridor, the entire known universe winks. At other times nobody even notices.

- The special effects, if we can call it that, are just irritating. The first corridor-struggle-in-negative-while-superimposed-on-nebula-picture-then-spinning-"newspaper"-effect was plenty, but we have to sit through it several times. Really awful.

- Speaking of irritating, don't you just want to reach out and yank that sad excuse for a beard off of Lazarus' chin? And don't they have showers in the 23rd century? What about medical hygiene? Twice, the man is laying in bed in sick bay covered with dirt and with blood all over his mouth.

I read somewhere that the reason for at least some of this mess is that a major plot point was removed after the fact. It involved a romantic interest between Lazarus and the engineering lieutenant. But because southern stations were worried about offending their Bible Belt viewers with an interracial romance, there was last minute editing to replace what may have been a coherent plot with a redundant and confusing mess. If so, then the greatest value of this episode is to provide a testament to the stupidity of racial intolerance and religious fanaticism.

Honestly, what is so wrong with this episode to make it get such negative reviews! I will never understand why this episode gets shot down all the time.

Is it because theres no 'real' fight scenes, if so, that's bogus, the storyline is great, and one of the best of the series, I'm not going to ruin it, but I will tell you that you have to pay attention to this one, or you won't get it, maybe thats what more people should've done with this episode, anything that deals in time, or parrallel universes requires paying attention, because the two genres are tricky, and is one aspect of sci-fi that makes it so great!

Yes, there are holes in logic big enough to pilot a starship through. And yes, watching the two versions of Lazarus spend the episode trading places is annoying in the extreme, helping to send this episode to the bottom of the barrel. But beneath this nonsense there is a message carefully clothed in sci-fi terms.

Robert Brown (Here Comes the Brides) plays Lazarus, a man who discovered a doorway to a parallel "negative" universe. For every positive particle in our universe, there's a corresponding particle of anti-matter in the other universe. According to the script's whacky theory, if two versions of the same person meet outside an inter-universe corridor, it will somehow annihilate both universes. Quite illogical, but necessary to the plot.

But here's what almost makes the episode interesting: one version of Lazarus is sane, the other insane. The one who's insane is the one who cannot stand the idea of a duplicate of himself in another universe. He'd rather blow up both universes than live with that. He talks about "a holy cause" and "vengeance" against the "monster [i.e. the other Lazarus]." The meaning is clear: those who rant and rave about destroying "the evil ones" are usually the most dangerous people in any society. Ironically, to be too quick to label others as evil is to become evil yourself.

As Lazarus, Robert Brown sports a weird-looking goatee that makes him look like an ancient prophet or shaman. (Or beatnik.) Then there's the name "Lazarus" itself. The religious connotations are not coincidence. Religious fanatics in any religion, who are quick to label others as devils, become devils themselves. No religion is specifically discussed, but the allusions in phrases such as "holy cause" and "the fires of hell" are clear. The inter-universe corridor is clearly hell, but only because Lazarus has made it so.

The biggest irony of all, of course, is that to Lazarus A (from our universe), the "evil one" is Lazarus B -- who looks exactly like him!!! Only today can we perhaps appreciate the irony. The religious fanatics on both sides want to kill each other, and yet aren't they rather similar? One side quotes the Bible, the other side quotes the Koran, but otherwise don't they sound alike? Both preach about a "holy cause." This may be a stretch, but I believe that the Lazarus A/B dichotomy suggests this theme. Unfortunately, this episode is very weak compared to other first-season episodes. One problem may be that there was originally a relationship between Lazarus and an Enterprise crew member. But when an African-American actress was cast in the role, the producers chickened out for fear of reaction in the Deep South, and they rewrote the actress' part so it was much less interesting.

The Alternative Factor is the 1966 TOS Episode featuring Lazarus and his anti-matter counterpart. Lazarus is a madman who is obsessed with his counterpart and has devoted his life to finding and annihilating him (and 2 universes in the process).

A few inconsistencies abound in this one. First, it's pretty confusing trying to keep track of which Lazarus is which as they go back and forth through the portal. Second, as one reviewer suggested, why didn't Kirk just kill one of them (or why didn't the anti-matter one just kill himself)? Third, when Spock and Kirk talk about the physics behind it, Spock starts out saying when counterparts meet from parallel universes they "cancel themselves out violently". Then out of nowhere Spock says it's matter-antimatter and that means the total annihilation of both universes. No only is this inconsistent in the dialogue, but illogical (are you listening Spock?) scientifically.

Fourth, why are they locked in the corridor for all eternity? Wouldn't they die eventually? Or don't people need food in the corridor; or do they become immortal there? If time stops there, then it's no big deal as they wouldn't be conscious anyway.

Fifth, Lazarus says he's a "time traveler". Why do they stay in the same time throughout the episode then?

Sixth, if they are parallel wouldn't there be a Kirk and Spock counterpart also (this is explored in a later and superior episode)? And why is the Lazarus in Kirk's world insane, while the other sane? If they are that different from each other why would the matter-Lazarus be obsessed with someone who isn't really like him (save his looks).

Nonetheless, with all these flaws it's still worth watching, as the idea of the annihilation of the universe and eternal hell in the corridor are profound concepts, though they are only brought out toward the end and undeveloped. And this, one of the weaker TOS episodes still towers over the later series
imho.

The episode begins promisingly enough, with an unexplained shake-up and a hint that the galaxy is about to be invaded. The action never surfaces, however. The only conflict takes place in a not-quite-psychedelic realm between two galaxies where two silhouettes engage in hand-to-hand combat every ten minutes or so. It's not clear who is who or even who we should be rooting for. It's confusing and there is a strange lack of satisfaction when the conustion is resolved.

The episode plods along and would have deserved a one-star rating if not for a bit of extremely noble martyrdom performed by a lead character.

This episode is in no way vital to the success of the series as a whole.

"The Alternative Factor" is one of the worst episodes of the original Star Trek. Spock and the crew find what seems to be a dead planet. Kirk finds a man named Lazarus and they beam back up to the Enterprise. They later find out that Lazarus is a time traveller and there's a mysterious being on the dead planet that he says is actually a person trying to interfere with his time travel. Lazarus will do anything to get some crystals so he can get in his flying saucer and get off the planet as soon as he can.

"The Alternative Factor" isn't the worst episode of the original series, but it's not one of the best. The plot is strange and it makes you wonder what it's even about at times. I wouldn't recommend getting "The Alternative Factor" unless you're a diehard Trek fan.

A strange, confusing, and just plain weird show. The first time I saw it, I didn't have any idea what was going on.It took me about three viewing to figure out the plot. Some good scenes here and there, but very strange

This episode is clearly in the bottom five of the original Star Trek series. It starts with the basic idea of twins, one good and the other evil, almost identical in structure, but opposite in temperament. In this case, both are named Lazurus and each is from a different universe. This basic idea had already been used in episode 5, "The Enemy Within", where a transporter malfunction split Kirk into his good and evil personalities. However, that is only one reason why this episode is so weak.
Supposedly, because one is from a matter universe and the other from an antimatter universe, if they ever meet, it will cause the destruction of both universes. This is of course scientifically absurd, when any antimatter encounters any matter equal amounts of both are converted into energy. Therefore, the antimatter Lazurus would have been destroyed when he first encountered the matter of the Enterprise.
The two Lazuruses pop back and forth across their universes, making it difficult for you to determine which one is currently on the Enterprise. As they perform their universe hopping, the crew of the Enterprise is befuddled, although they eventually figure out that they are dealing with two distinct individuals. The solution is to wait until they both are in the process
of hopping from one universe to another and then destroy their ships, which is what created the path between the universes.
This traps them in the "corridor" between the universes, where the mad Lazurus will eternally be at the throat of the good one. The absurdity of this solution seems lost on all the participants. Obviously, if being in the corridor has rendered you immortal, then even the actions of a madman could not harm you. The simplest solution would have been to kill the mad
Lazarus, saving both universes. Nevertheless, there is a sensible reason why the creators did not choose this option, as that allowed them to pose the one interesting theme of the story,
that one can end up in purgatory by committing actions worthy of a saint.
I have trouble ranking what I consider to be the top and bottom five episodes of the original Star Trek series. Therefore, I cannot say that I rank this one last, but it is tied for 75th place.

While orbiting what should be a dead planet, the U.S.S. Enterprise experiences a moment of "nonexistence." Starfleet Command fears an enemy invasion and orders Kirk to find out what caused the stellar system disturbance. On the planet below, Kirk finds a man called Lazarus, who tells Kirk that the effect was caused by his enemy. Lazarus has been chasing him with the aid of a time/space craft and wants the Enterprise's dilithium crystals to continue his search. The captain refuses. When Kirk takes Lazarus aboard the Enterprise, it becomes apparent that there is something strange about their visitor. He has incredible mood swings, one minute sane and rational, the next exhibiting violent rage. He also has a bloody head wound that disappears, then reappears moments later. Lazarus manages to steal the ship's dilithium and return to the planet. Kirk follows and discovers that Lazarus is two people -- one sane and one a madman, with one from an anti-matter universe. The sane Lazarus informs Kirk that the beings can only appear in either universe one at a time. Should both men be in the same place at the same time, both universes would be destroyed. Kirk helps the sane Lazarus trap his counterpart in an intermediate time corridor where they can hurt neither the matter nor anti-matter universe, but where the two will be trapped in fight until the end of time.