A bona fide Scotty episode that is part Perry Mason mystery with some Jack the Ripper thrown in for good measure! Knife murders on a hedonistic "pleasure planet" is linked to Scotty who has occasional bouts with memory loss: could this be tied to a latent psychosis linked to resentment towards the female sex due to an incident which caused him a concussion (explosion in the engine room). I can just visualize feminists, listening to the line about how women are far more scared and ease towards fear than men, steaming at the ears. Scotty takes a walk in the foggy streets of Argelius II with a dancer from a club, when a scream reaches the ears of Kirk and Bones as they walk to a particular "den where the women are
" Finding the dancer dead, Kirk discovers Scotty in shock, holding the murder blade in his hand. When other murders to women happen near Scotty (an officer of the Enterprise, the sensitive who unearths the evil causing the killings), he falls under further suspicion. The Enterprise has tools which could truly get to the truth, but Kirk will need permission from the planet's prefect (Charles Macauley) and has to deal with the law officer prosecuting Scotty (Winnie the Pooh's own John Fiedler) with plenty of speculative zeal, always questioning the efforts of Kirk to find out if his engineer is guilty or not. The prefect's wife, during the séance, mentioned three names, one of which calls on Jack the Ripper! Then the episode really goes for a twist: could Jack the Ripper actually be human form subjected with a possessive evil force that moves from one planet to another, occupying bodies to violently stab women and feed from fear in order to survive?!?! Scotty's innocence should obviously never be in any doubt, but I sure didn't see the lifeform which moves from one body to another linked to Jack the Ripper coming! Robert Bloch, leave it to him to come up with such an outlandish but provocative development right out of left field. Seeing Fiedler play into the finale where Kirk must punch him out cold and flip him over (well, the stunt double for him, anyway) is hilarious. The form taking over the Enterprise controls, cackling and talking a big game of what it will do to the crew, hoping to scare them, is just plain surreal. The trial of Scotty (there have been instances where our heroes undergo questioning in judgment or potential crime that might cost them dearly) puts him front and center (for the most part), with the history of "the Ripper" from one planet to another, connecting specific times it went on murder sprees, is quite an "out of left field" wrinkle in the story. Unexpected, to be sure, and goes from a rather intense mystery to an all out comedy (unintentionally or not). Feeding a mathematical equation into the ship computers to confuse the lifeform, and then giving the crew hypos which ease them into joy without the influence of fear, the episode really goes the kitchen sink route. A lot of fun, if a bit bonkers.
Review of Wolf in the Fold
