History Recap / StarTrekS3E16TheMarkOfGideon

The planet of Gideon has refused anything to do with the United Federation of Planets until recently. The council has agreed to allow a delegation of one...one Captain James T. Kirk. Kirk has himself beamed down to the planet only to find himself beamed aboard his own starship, sans crew. Where is everybody? Kirk searches everywhere, hails everyone he can think of. His voice over the intercom reverberates off the walls of empty rooms. Kirk searches until he finds a rather dippy blonde in sparkly blue and purple PJ's dancing by herself in the corridors. [[GirlOfTheWeek Her name is Odona.]] She's not sure where she's from, just that it was crowded. Spock, meanwhile, is playing bureaucratic ping-pong for permission to search for the missing captain.

* ArtisticLicenseBiology: Leaving aside the fact that it's impossible for a planet to be "germ free"...if Gideon were completely germ free as said, it wouldn't result in people living very long lives. It would result in a population that had zero immunity...also leaving aside the fact that complex life can only exist in symbiosis with single celled life (a typical human contains 3 times as many bacteria cells as human cells--most of which are beneficial to us). The entire population would be wiped out as soon as any pathogen were introduced. It wouldn't take an exotic, deadly illness like Kirk carried to do it. It would happen the first time they came in contact with alien visitors.

** Even SPOCK is done with his crap after a while.

* CurseCutShort: Scotty bites his tongue before insulting the Gideon council before begrudgingly referring to them as "gentlemen."

* LiteraryAllusionTitle: A reference to the biblical story of Gideon, who used seemingly arbitrary methods to reduce the size of his army.

* ObstructiveBureaucrat: Admiral Fitzerald, the rest of Starfleet Command and the Federation’s Bureau of Planetary Treaties.
* OntologicalMystery: Kirk beamed from his ship...to his ship...or is it his ship?

* PlanetOfHats: Kirk is kidnapped by a race whose universal pro-life tendencies had lead to horrible overpopulation, to the point that they tried to start a pandemic with germs from Kirk (who had been exposed to Vegan choreomeningitis in the past). Kirk flaunts Humanity's "freedom" hat by stating categorically that he does not want to stay on this planet as their own hemlock dispenser and instead suggests using one of many forms of birth control the Federation had to offer. (Um...you remembered to use one on Odona, right, Kirk?)

* PrinciplesZealot: People of Gideons are against contraception because love and life is sacred, so bringing death and sickness is the only acceptable solution.
* SendInTheSearchTeam: Spock wants to do this to find Kirk, but [[ObstructiveBureaucrat neither Gideon or the Federation]] will give permission to do so. He decides ScrewTheRulesImDoingWhatsRight and beams down to go in search of Captain Kirk himself.
* SpottingTheThread: Spock realizes that the coordinates provided for a test beaming, and those used to beam down Captain Kirk, don't match--the first two coordinates are the same, but the third coordinate (presumably the Z coordinate) is not.
* StockFootage: When Kirk tries to address anyone on the ship, one of the shots, showing an empty corridor, is recycled from "[[{{Recap/StarTrekS3E5IsThereInTruthNoBeauty}} Is There in Truth No Beauty?]]" Also, another shot shows an empty Sickbay - with the Red Alert indicator light flashing, an obvious pickup shot from an earlier episode.
* TemptingFate: When Spock decides he will look for Kirk by himself (asking another crew member to accompany him would just get him in further trouble with Starfleet) he announces "I will not be long." Scotty points out that Kirk said the same thing.
* WellIntentionedExtremist: Gideons are ready to use [[UtopiaJustifiestheMeans lethal and painful methods to restore their paradise]].

* WouldBeRudeToSayGenocide: Self inflicted genocide, no less. Because of the horrible overpopulation and that horrible healthyness, you see. But no birth control, because we love life so much, you know. So instead of ordering us some starships, we would much prefer your painful disease now.

The planet of Gideon has refused anything to do with the United Federation of Planets until recently. The council has agreed to allow a delegation of one...one Captain James T. Kirk. Kirk has himself beamed down to the planet only to find himself beamed aboard his own starship, sans crew. Where is everybody? Kirk searches everywhere, hails everyone he can think of. His voice over the intercom reverberates off the walls of empty rooms. Kirk searches until he finds a rather dippy blonde in sparkly blue and purple PJ's dancing by herself in the corridors. [[GirlOfTheWeek Her name is Odona.]] She's not sure where she's from, just that it was crowded. It isn't long before Kirk is BoldlyComing. (You can bet they didn't go into that room to play Parcheesi!) Spock, meanwhile, is playing bureaucratic ping-pong for permission to search for the missing captain.

* CannotKeepASecret: Someone in Starfleet, since the Gideon government has access to a lot of useful information about the Enterprise and her Captain.

The planet of Gideon has refused anything to do with the United Federation of Planets until recently. The council has agreed to allow a delegation of one...one Captain James T. Kirk. Kirk has himself beamed down to the planet only to find himself beamed aboard his own starship, sans crew. Where is everybody? Kirk searches everywhere, hails everyone he can think of. His voice over the intercom reverberates off the walls of empty rooms. Kirk searches until he finds a rather dippy blonde in sparkly blue and purple PJ's dancing by herself in the corridors. Oh, Donna! No, actually [[GirlOfTheWeek her name is Odona.]] She's not sure where she's from, just that it was so crowded it made a [[Music/TheWho Who]] concert look tranquil. It isn't long before Kirk is BoldlyComing. (You can bet they didn't go into that room to play Parcheesi!) Spock, meanwhile, is playing bureaucratic ping-pong for permission to search for the missing captain.