YMMV / Star Trek S1 E15 "Shore Leave"

• Awesome Music: The piece that plays throughout the episode, often referred to as "Finnegan's Theme".
• Bizarro Episode: One of the most delightfully surreal episodes. In fact, the script was initially re-written because it veered from science fiction into straight up fantasy.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Dr. McCoy tries to tell everyone he saw this giant rabbit (meant to be the White Rabbit of Alice in Wonderland). After TOS was cancelled, DeForest Kelley starred in Night of the Lepus, which featured Giant Killer Bunny Rabbits.
  • And the extra detail of "a little blond girl" being seen with the rabbit.
  • Phelous milked these similarities for absolutely everything in his review of this movie.
  • It won't be the last time a Sufficiently Advanced Alien called "The Caretaker" causes trouble for a Starfleet crew.
  • TOS did Holodeck Malfunction episodes before it was cool (and before the holodeck had even been invented!)
• Ho Yay:
  • The episode opens with Kirk complaining about his stiff back. Yeoman Barrows, standing behind him, takes it upon herself to massage the kinks out. Kirk enjoys this, but thinks it's Spock, who was also standing behind him. When Spock enters Kirk's field of vision (just as Kirk was about to tell him to "dig in there,") Kirk curtly orders the Yeoman to cease the backrub. So, Kirk would rather get a massage from his best friend and first officer than the cute female yeoman, huh?
  • Still under the happy effect of one of the constructs, Kirk is notified that something is amiss by both McCoy and another officer. He doesn't snap out of the happy daze until Spock himself contacts him about it.
• Like You Would Really Do It: Few viewers were actually convinced that McCoy was dead after being seemingly killed by a lance.
• Special Effect Failure:
  • The antenna that apparently scans the thoughts of the crew to generate the constructs. It's a pretty flimsy TV aerial clearly held in front of the camera by a stagehand crouching below frame.
  • The supposedly wild and dangerous tiger has a chain around its neck and is pretty chill around the actors (the chain is far more noticeable in HD rereleases).
  • Thanks to stitching together Stock Footage, the airplanes morph between approximately three different designs depending on the shot. And in one shot there are two planes.

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