The Jihad by: Stephen Kandel and directed by: Hal Sutherland

 

“The Jihad” is written by: Stephen Kandel and is directed by: Hal Sutherland.  It was produced under production code 22014, was the 16^th episode of Star Trek: The Animated Series, and was broadcast on January 12, 1974.

 

It’s incredibly weird for the first season finale of Star Trek: The Animated Series to be titled “The Jihad”, an Arabic word that has multiple meanings generally referring to inner struggle and strife but also colloquially refers to the idea of holy war.  The holy war idea is a particularly popular interpretation of the word jihad since 1965’s Dune was published with the Butlerian Jihad an essential part of that novel’s worldbuilding.  There is little doubt in my mind that author Stephen Kandel titled the episode “The Jihad” because of Dune, even if it isn’t a particularly accurate title.  This is an episode attempting to avert a war instead of dealing with any direct consequences of conflict or struggle.  Stephen Kandel also writes something entirely different from his three other Star Trek episodes, a quest episode where Kirk and Spock are recruited to recover a stolen religious artifact with a team of aliens to avoid a holy war.  Kandel establishes a team with every member having a role to play: Kirk is a leader and Spock is a strategist while the human Lara (voiced by Jane Webb, an actress familiar to Filmation productions) is a tracker, the reptilian Sord is the muscle, the insectoid EM3 Green is a lockpick, and the prince of the Skorr, Tcharr, represents the species from which the artifact was stolen.

 

The episode itself it pretty much going from place to place in an attempt to find the artefact: from icescapes, to forgotten temples, to giant chasms, until it’s eventually revealed who is responsible for stealing the artefact.  It’s not a bad premise for an episode, but Kandel almost overstuffs the 24 minute runtime with set pieces so there isn’t quite enough for each to feel quite complete.  This is also an episode where the animators, usually great on backgrounds as a visual feast, have clearly put their effort into designing the aliens joining Kirk and Spock on their mission.  The aliens are far more than the stereotypical Star Trek aliens being humans with distinctive headgear of some sort: there’s a humanoid bird, a humanoid reptile, and a humanoid insect.  All humanoid because it is easier to draw in a people shape and get dialogue out in lip flaps.  The climax of the episode is actually quite weak, Tchar’s betrayal is kind of the obvious answer and the action doesn’t really work on the show’s budget.  Menioned above was Jane Webb who appears due to both Nichelle Nichols and Majel Barrett being unavailable, but this episode also featured writer David Gerrold as EM3 Green adds to the episode standing out because of it.

 

Overall, Star Trek: The Animated Series ends its first season on an episode very much in the way that it began with “Beyond the Farthest Star”, doing something different and pushing the boundaries of what Star Trek could normally do.  It’s certainly a decent episode and doesn’t fall into the problem of being an episode that the viewer is going to immediately forget, but it is an episode where the ideas clearly need more time to really develop with added character in toe.  I applaud “The Jihad” anyway for being an episode that is at least interesting and accomplishes something different, the resolution having Kirk and Spock succeed but with no glory is a particularly nice twist.  6/10.