Spock's Brain: Why The 'Worst' Star Trek Episode Divides Fans
When an episode includes immortal dialogue like "Brain and brain! What is brain?" you know it's headed for infamy. But sometimes, as any "Star Trek" fan knows, infamy breeds affection.
"Spock's Brain" is widely known as one of the worst outings in the history of the original series, even making the top 100 in David Hofstede's immortal tome "What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History." The Season 3 episode sees the Enterprise approach an unidentified spacecraft. When the ship passes the craft's orbit, it knocks everyone unconscious. When the rest of the crew awakens, they find Spock (Leonard Nimoy) in the sick bay — alive, but inexplicably missing his brain. The frequently lovable James T. Kirk (William Shatner) leads the crew on a desperate search for the brain thief. She turns out to be Kara (Marj Dusay), who wants to enslave men universe-wide and turn them into brainless cavemen. It's up to Kirk to put Spock's brain back in his head. Meanwhile, McCoy (DeForest Kelly) remotely controls Spock's brainless body.
The episode has earned much disdain over the years — it sits at a 5.6 on IMDb, making it one of the worst-ranked episodes of the show, and even Shatner and Nimoy expressed their distaste for the episode, despite it becoming a legendary part of Spock's backstory. Yet the episode does have some defenders among "Star Trek" fans. "Yes I know that Leonard Nimoy hated it and I don't blame him, as he has nothing interesting to do in the entire episode. However I find myself enjoying the episode every time I watch it. There is just something very charming about it," confessed u/JeremyAPerron on the "Star Trek" Reddit.
Star Trek fans have defended Spock's Brain
In spite of its reputation, a number of "Star Trek" fans admit they actually like the cheesy nature of "Spock's Brain." u/OpsikionThemed knows it's not a smart episode, but that's not why they like it. "It's a fun episode! Dumb as a sack of hammers, but hardly deserving of its 'worst ever' reputation," they said. Most fans who like the episode note that the dramatic line delivery, nonsensical plot, and completely off-kilter science are all part of the episode's charm. In the end, the large divide of opinion seems to boil down to how serious one needs their "Star Trek" to be. In short: "Spock's Brain is MST3K-episode bad, and that's why it's one of my favorites," noted an anonymous user.
Even a number of IMDb fans are fond of the episode. "It's certainly one of the loonier plots, especially when McCoy wires the brainless Spock body for remote control. But the great thing is how the whole thing is treated completely seriously by all the actors," observed user Bigaiv.
In the end, "Spock's Brain" will likely go down in history as the campiest edition of the original series, even as it becomes less reviled over time as one of the show's worst episodes. After all — how bad can it really be if it inspired a Phish song?