Visions of Delight, Visions of Horror: Loving and Hateful Androids in *Star Trek* Episode 7 (Post 4)

Andrea and Ruk -- Two Androids

Tonight's post is the fourth in my series that treats on a science fiction class I taught at Case Western Reserve University in the Summer of 2011. Here is a link to the first post, where the class is explained in detail: Visions of Delight, Visions of Horror (Post 1)

One of the first "television show texts" we looked at in this class was an episode from the original Star Trek: season 1, episode 7, titled, "What Are Little Girls Made Of?" This episode was written by Robert Bloch, a famous science fiction, horror, and fantasy writer who published in--*drum roll*--Weird Tales. Bloch was close friends with H.P. Lovecraft who was, some have argued, his mentor and main source of encouragement. 

One of these days I'll treat his fiction here, but I think it's noteworthy to mention that the Star Trek episode we watched was written by a member of the H.P. Lovecraft circle.

Anyhow, what is this episode about and how did it relate to the class as a whole? 

Well, let me offer some summary. In this episode Nurse Christine Chapel is in search of her long lost fiance, Dr. Roger Korby. Korby's last known whereabouts were the planet Exo III, where he went to study an extinct race. Long story short: the race that once inhabited Exo III were destroyed by a race of androids they created. We have here the somewhat classical narrative of the robot uprising. But here's the twist. In the course of the episode it becomes clear that Korby has mastered the art of creating androids and that he is, in fact, an android himself. The original Korby died and he downloaded his consciousness into an android body.

This episode raises some very interesting questions, particularly about the relationship between robots and humans. We get both kinds of relationships represented here: love and hate. Let me explain.

Love. One of the androids introduced in this episode is a beautiful girl, Andrea. Captain Kirk, of course, seduces her and she falls in love with him. And through her love for Kirk she comes to regret being an android, i.e. being unable to love fully. Another example: Dr. Roger Korby--who is himself an android--is deeply in love with Nurse Chapel; however, she rejects him because he is an android. 

Hate. Meanwhile, there's another android--a giant, monstrous android--named "Ruk," who seems to hate all humans and wants to kill them all. Furthermore, the human characters never fully come to trust the androids and, in the end, kill them with little fanfare. They are figured as tragic transgressions of the natural order and therefore abominations.

There's another interesting theme that shows up in this episode that recurs over and over in other texts we looked at in this class. This theme is the "sexy android" character. Most of the time the android is a woman. There are all sorts of science fiction texts that turn technology into women; thus, male protagonists engage with technology as a woman. Think of Fritz Lang's Metropolis, Bladerunner, the reboot of Battlestar Galactica. I plan doing a specific post that treats on this theme of technology-as-woman.