4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Boldly going....to Vietnam?, July 18, 2001
This review is from: Star Trek - The Original Series, Episode 45: A Private Little War [VHS] (VHS Tape)
The crew of the Enterprise visits an idyllic, pre-industrialized world inhabited by the docile hill-people and the greedy villagers. Not incorporated into the Federation of Planets, this pre-techno world is supposed to be free of any interference by either the Federation or the Klingon empire. Nevertheless, on a routine survey, the villagers attack the hill people with crude rifles - though that requires technology beyond them. With Mr. Spock severely injured, Kirk stays behind looking for evidence that the Klingons are illegally supplying technology that will allow the villagers to conquer the planet and rule it for the Klingons. Reuniting with the Hill People, among whom Kirk once lived, Kirk hooks up with their leader, Tyree and his wife, the bewitching Nona. Sneaking into the Villagers' stronghold, Kirk finds evidence of non-indigenous technology (carbon-free metal tools are a big tip-off). Though implicating the Klingons, Kirk now faces an even bigger quandry - allow the rapacious villagers to conquer the planet, or give the hill-people the means to fight back. Either alternative gurantees bloodshed, with the decision coming down to ensuring either the genocide of the hill people or a ceaseless and bloody war with the villagers. Dr. McCoy, who stayed planetside with Kirk, provides the perfect moral foil for Kirk who is defiantly pro-defense.
I must have seen this episode a hundred times as a kid, never knowing that it was obviously a take on the war in Vietnam which had already escalated by then. The weird part is how this film makes as the enemies, the urbanized and technologically advanced villagers, which is more analogous to the Southern Vietnamese regime. Like the very best sci-fi, when it must be topical, the script is dignified enough to explore both sides. It's a weak episode of Trek, suffering because the comedy team of Bones and Spock spends much of the time apart (with Spock stuck on the Enterprise, recuperating from the attack in the beginning of the episode). The script tries juicing things up with the wicked-hot Nona and an attack by the "Mugato", a sort of white, horned gorilla with poison fangs, that both seem to distract from the message of the show (which may have been the biggest reason for putting them there - the guys who write for Trek were brave, but to a fault). A flawed but still important episode.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Horn + white ape suit = alien, February 9, 2001
This review is from: Star Trek - The Original Series, Episode 45: A Private Little War [VHS] (VHS Tape)
I once overlooked this episode and it took me a number of years to realize just how good it is. Along with Friday's Child, the Cloud Minders and Operation:Annihilate, this is one of the most underated episodes of the series. Yes, the Mugato looked like it would put a gleem in Irwin Allen's eye and the Natives wear third rate poofy wigs, but the story is just terrific. They took a foreign intervention story and stuck it out on a primitve planet plus Kirk fights a healer's influence and Spock fights off a possibly fatal attack. This episode is well written and carried out in fine fashion.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Inspiring, February 18, 2002
This review is from: Star Trek - The Original Series, Episode 45: A Private Little War [VHS] (VHS Tape)
I loved the episode so much when I first saw it six years ago,that it inspired me to begin an original serial using a Nona type character as the lead, and Tyree's people as my character's adopted people. Some reading this would say "so what?" but others would say that if an episode that has such good writing can inspire a budding writer, it's gotta be good! As to the Viet Nam parallel that people are referring to, I see the episode as just good story telling on it's own merit.
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