The Omega Glory by: Gene Roddenberry and directed by: Vincent McEveety

 

“The Omega Glory” is written by Gene Roddenberry and is directed by Vincent McEveety.  It was filmed under production code 54, was the 23^rd episode of Star Trek Season 2, the 52^nd episode of Star Trek, and was broadcast on March 1, 1968.

 

Star Trek became incredibly lucky in 1966 when Samuel A. Peeples was chosen to write “Where No Man Has Gone Before” as the second pilot that directly led to the show being picked up for its first season.  The other two scripts in consideration for the slot were ideas directly from Gene Roddenberry, the campy but terribly problematic “Mudd’s Women” and “The Omega Glory”.  “The Omega Glory” is the weakest episode thus far, somehow manages to sink below the mess that was “The Gamesters of Triskelion”, largely due to opening with so much potential before completely wasting it in favor of an incredibly racist and borderline nationalistic episode towards the United States of America.  It is fascinating as the idea came directly from Roddenberry who just four episodes earlier adapted Jud Crucis’ “A Private Little War” which directly criticized the United States Government and its involvement in the Vietnam War (even if that episode also was of a lower quality).  The opening of the episode does begin quite well: the USS Exeter is orbiting planet Omega IV and all that remains of the crew are chemical salts bar Captain Ronald Tracey, played by Morgan Woodward, who is living on the planet.  In the general scheme of the episode Tracey becomes our main villain.  As soon as the crew, Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and a red shirt, arrive on Omega IV the episode begins to take the nosedive in quality as Tracey has broken the Prime Directive and become ruthless in his interference.  This break in this particular episode is used almost as a stand in for an American citizen defecting to join the Soviet Union during the Cold War, something believed to be done for the selfish gain of a defector which would be fine on its own but “The Omega Glory” takes story choices that add this as one issue on an episode full of issues.

 

Omega IV has two tribes of people, the Yangs and Kohms locked in an eternal war and Tracey is on the side of the Kohms.  These tribes are humans, the Kohms being explicitly Asian in portrayal including yellowface on several actors which already is a poor choice from production, especially since George Takei as Sulu features in the episode and there are clearly some actors of Asian descent used.  This includes stereotypical Asian accents and several characters being the stoic, silent stereotype of an Asian especially present in media of the era.  This would be bad enough if not for the episode’s big twist being that Yang and Kohm are language devolutions of ‘Yankee’ and ‘Communist’, approximately at the time where the savage Yangs are suddenly taking over and begin to be portrayed sympathetically, they are American after all.  The episode builds to the conclusion of veneration of both the Pledge of Allegiance and preamble to the United States’ Constitution, while the latter is an incredibly important historical document that does lay out the eventual goal of the United States as a land of freedom, the episode refuses to engage with the idea of what the words actually mean nor what the United States is.  The imagery of the US flag is revered as a sacred relic by director Vincent McEveety and the score quotes “The Star-Spangled Banner” at several points as full reverence to the country.  This reverence is in an episode where the Yangs, our stand in for America, are brought to the conclusion that it is their right to rule the planet, giving the Kohms an equal place in society which is the absolute thinnest of silver linings.  The use of communist as a connotation for the Kohms also lends this episode to at least a partial pro-capitalist reading, even if the conflict is explicitly in a feudal setting, which is especially odd for Roddenberry’s own view of the future presented in Star Trek as post-scarcity and essentially in a communist like system of governance at the very least.

 

Overall, “The Omega Glory” is just an episode that does not seem to be aware of what it is doing in terms of the director and actors in the episode while Roddenberry’s script knows exactly the patriotic propaganda the episode is, something that feels outside of Roddenberry’s general political scope especially.  It quickly becomes this glorification of the United States of America, almost warmongering the idea of the USA being the stewards of Earth in a revival of manifest destiny and no real examination of what that might mean for the future.  Not only content to be borderline nationalist, it’s also filled with Asian stereotypes and an unhinged villain who could also be read as a Communist defector in another incredibly weird choice.  This is clearly going to be one of the episodes near the bottom of Star Trek and is best forgotten.  1/10.