Star Trek – Turnabout Intruder

★★★1/2 June 3, 1969 Season 3 Episode 24

If you want to see where we are…and you missed a few…HERE is a list of the episodes in my index located at the top of my blog. 

This show was written by Gene Roddenberry and Arthur Singer

This is IT! The last episode of the last season. Because the original series was canceled instead of coming to a natural end, and the idea of a series finale was not as popular in the 1960s, “Turnabout Intruder” was close to a normal episode and did not have the “finale” touches. The remastered version of “Turnabout Intruder” ended with the Enterprise flying toward a colorful nebula, to artistically signify the episode as being the last of the original series.

First of all, I want to thank all of you for reading all of these posts or just dropping back by once in a while. I know I narrow my audience doing these television shows so I am so thankful that some of you who really never watched it jumped in and I hope some of you come away watching a few of them. Some of you like Lisa, Obbverse, and Liam re-watched the shows as we went along and I thank you for it and the rest that did.

This episode is basically “Freaky Friday” in space.

Kirk’s body gets kidnapped by his former lover Janice Lester (played by Sandra Smith) who has gone jealously insane over the fact that Starfleet apparently doesn’t allow women captains (Roddenberry regretted this in the script). While the script may have been intended as a social commentary on the 1960s, it doesn’t quite work for a Star Trek series that was supposedly set in the 23rd century.

Star Trek - Turnabout Intruder B

Surely by then, women would have risen up the ranks to become captains of starships! While it seems implausible that Kirk would allow his body to be kidnapped on Camus II by an alien device, this cannot be dismissed outright. As Spock rightly notes, the Enterprise has been to many new places and witnessed many strange events. Moreover, Kirk was once cloned in ‘What Are Little Girls Made of?’ and even split into two in ‘The Enemy Within.’

I think Shatner does a fair acting job in this one. He is much more emotional because Lester is in his body. I think this one is an average episode of the third season. Not one of the greats but not bad. 

From IMDB:

William Shatner had a severe case of ‘flu’ during filming of this episode. At one point, he had to lift Sandra Smith in his arms, carry her to a couch and put her on it: during the first take, he got as far as the couch and dropped her. Fortunately, it was well padded, and Smith bounced several times; according to Joanie Winston, who was visiting the set, Shatner looked down at Smith and said, “You know I love you, baby, but you’ve got to lose about six inches off that ass.”

Leonard Nimoy is the only actor to appear in every episode of the series. William Shatner appeared in every episode with the exception of the first pilot, The Cage (1966).

Gene Roddenberry regretted the line about the Federation supposedly not allowing female captains, as he felt it was sexist.

The transposition sequence was the last footage shot for The Original Series.

This episode is subtly referenced in Legacy (1990). Jean-Luc Picard mentions that they are bypassing an archaeological survey on Camus II, the same planet that this episode begins on. This was mentioned because, with the airing of its 80th episode “Legacy”, Star Trek: The Next Generation officially became longer than TOS.

Leonard Nimoy (Spock) and Majel Barrett (Nurse Christine Chapel and Number One) are the only actors to appear in both the series finale and the first pilot The Cage (1966).

Nurse Chapel’s (Majel Barrett) hair color is brown for this episode, not its usual blonde color.

This episode was originally scheduled for broadcast on March 28, 1969. Special network coverage of the death of Dwight D. Eisenhower pre-empted it, and it didn’t air until June 3.

Lieutenant Galloway reappears in this episode, despite being killed by Ronald Tracey in The Omega Glory (1968). He was credited as Galloway (misspelled as “Galoway”) even though actor David L. Ross had been recast as Lieutenant Johnson in Day of the Dove (1968) after the character of Galloway was killed off.

Although this was the last episode of the Original Series to be filmed and aired, this episode has a lower stardate than the previous episode, All Our Yesterdays (1969).

The production crew nicknamed this episode “Captain Kirk: Space Queen”.

Though her voice is muffled, Dr. Lester protests to Dr. Coleman, “Go to Hell!” a rare case of a “swear” sneaking past the network censors.

According to Harry Landers, he was very fatigued during this episode because he had just had his upper right lung removed due to an infection. He wanted to turn the role down but did it as a favor to producer Fred Freiberger.

After two years on the series, Roger Holloway finally gets to speak dialogue, all of two words. His character’s name (Lemli) was the same as William Shatner’s license plate at the time, a mixture of his daughters’ (Leslie, Melanie, Lisabeth) names.

Summary

On the planet Camus II, Kirk meets his old flame, Janice Lester, who is supposedly dying of radiation poisoning. She is a woman scorned and is out to get her revenge on Kirk with whom she was in love many years ago. She has discovered an alien process that will allow her to transfer her essence into Kirk’s body and vice versa. Returning to the Enterprise in Kirk’s body, she now has command of the Enterprise. Kirk on the other hand is now in Lester’s body and can get no one to believe that he is really Kirk. It soon becomes obvious that Lester is incapable of command, leading Spock to accept that she has, in fact, taken over Kirk’s body.

THANKS AGAIN! One final message…Live Long and Prosper. 

CAST

William Shatner … Captain James Tiberius ‘Jim’ Kirk
Leonard Nimoy … Mister Spock
DeForest Kelley … Dr. McCoy
Sandra Smith … Janice Lester
Harry Landers … Dr. Coleman
James Doohan … Scott
George Takei … Sulu
Walter Koenig … Chekov
Majel Barrett … Nurse Chapel
Barbara Baldavin … Communications Officer
David L. Ross … Lt. Galoway
John Boyer … Guard
Tom Anfinsen … Medical Technician (uncredited)
Bill Blackburn … Lieutenant Hadley (uncredited)
James Drake … Security Guard (uncredited)
Roger Holloway … Lt. Lemli (uncredited)

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Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, Alternative music, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player. Not the slightest bit interested in politics at all.

34 thoughts on “Star Trek – Turnabout Intruder”

  1. For a show that only lasted 3 seasons, this one had a lasting impact. Spock was very intuitive and if anyone could determine what life entity was inside of anyone, it would be him. I think the spinoffs were just as good and some way better than this original series and I would recommend them to anyone. Star Trek Voyager had a woman in charge Captain Janeway, but my favorite character on that show was Seven of Nine.

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    1. I’ve seen some of them….from what I’ve seen I liked… I think something the original had was those characters that everything followed.
      Have you ever seen Star Trek Continues?
      It was made by actors that were fans plus had “Scotty’s” real life son in it. It was a tribute to the original series…it’s on youtube.

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      2. The look is what is really cool…they really have got that from the orginal series. They even had some continuations from the original series with one of the same actors.

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  2. Thanks for running the Trek series reviews! Ive recently been re watching Twilight Zone as one of the vintage TV channels has been showing them, so I can compare with actual viewings now, there’s some good ones I didn’t know as well.

    This, like all TOS, I know inside out, and enjoyed for Shatner’s OTT histrionic performance, he did a decent job of it. Plotwise, making the female character a dubiously moral character, though, didn’t really do much for women’s rights and fed into the long-term view that Trek was a bit schizophrenic on the topic, bar Uhura – where ironically, the Number One character now central to Strange New Worlds, could have been another game changer if the Network hadn’t objected to her.

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    1. Thanks for reading! The show was historic…it helped make scifi popular on television….well not just popular but they made it smart. Many inventions came directly from this show…it was a game changer especially only lasting 3 seasons.

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      2. Thanks Obbverse….”Lost In Disgrace.” I’ll have to remember that. One of the most annoying characters in television was on that show…Dr Smith. I tried to watch it…I couldn’t get through it.

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    1. That wouldn’t be hard to do…I’m glad I have the index made and if anyone needs an episode guide they can use it. I use episode guides constantly so it’s cool to contribute.
      More people got into it than I originally thought…it shows on the whole…those stories hold up.

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  4. Congrats man. No easy feat to watch and write about each episode and then post your regular power pop tunes. I’m exhausted just thinking about it. lol. Freaky Friday in space. Good way to go out I suppose…
    Cheers pal…

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  5. I hated this episode. It’s in my bottom five of all the original series.

    I found out recently that not only did they not plan it as a finale but it was while they were filming this episode that the cast and crew received news that NBC had canceled the order for two more episodes, which is why season 3 is only 24 episodes long.

    I think it’s appropriate that the final words of the show are “if only,” uttered by Captain Kirk. It says a lot about season 3 and the cancellation of the show in a way. If only the execs had the faith to invest the time and resources to keep the show going at top quality. We got the movies at least!

    Thanks for posting all your reviews Max (and the call out in your post!). It was fun getting a different perspective as I was rewatching myself and talking about the episodes in these comments. Are you going to do The Animated Series next? I just watched it and it’s actually a lot better than I realized.

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    1. No problem Liam…I appreciate you rewatching them and participating.
      It will be a while before I do anymore TV shows but I do like the animated series….I remember one in paticualar about Spock’s pet and helping himself as a kid…I really enjoyed that one…I just looked it up…it’s called Yesteryear.

      Now I want to follow more people because during this…I could hardly read other blogs… The Twilight Zone was much worse though…it was a year and a half. This one was only 6-7 months.
      The animated would be easy though…it’s only 16 episodes.

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  6. Thanks Max, I couldn’t have reviewed 3 seasons of Star Trek or anything like it while
    remaining critical, being aware of the times, culture etc without flaming out somewhere through overload. (‘The mind cannae take the strain, Maxtain!’) It did get me back into watching it in a rough chronological order, sometimes in front of the curve, sometimes behind. In retrospect it tried hard to be a beacon of enlightenment, despite the behind the scenes executives (the real low-brow-low intelligence monsters in suits) not having the belief- or investment- in a Sci-Fi show. Every Sci -Fi show that has been on TV owes it a debt.

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    1. Thanks Obbverse…I’m not as critical as I should be at times but I do appreciate the show after going through it but it got rough at times.
      The third season really brought home how low-brow-low intelligence suits could get. At least they could have given them a decent budget and cancel it after the 3rd season instead of shoe stringing it through.

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      1. Sadly the network execs looked at the (those) days bottom line, not even considering residuals, reruns etc. Thanks to the reuse of film etc classic shows from the 50s early 60s have been lost forever, unless someone discovers some long forgotten reels in a dark dusty vault in Fiji or some far flung place.

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      2. Yea they would have had the same fate as silent films…that still once in a blue moon get discovered in Russia or somewhere that didn’t pay royalities.

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  7. I must have missed the part (or my mind blocked it out) that females were not allowed to be captains. I thought they passed her by because she didn’t have captain leadership qualities. In any case it became apparent she didn’t, but who is to say that the oppression didn’t mess with her mind? I don’t blame Kirk for moving along. What a nasty trick of taking over his body! Shatner is a punk for saying that about the actress losing some weight. He flipped the script on his own weakness because he was sick in an ugly way 😦

    THANK YOU for all of the hard work you put into this, Max. It’s much appreciated. You motivated me to watch every episode of TOS and it has been a lot of fun discussing them here.

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    1. I enjoyed doing it and talking about the different episodes. Again I do appreciate the interaction and you taking the time to watch them. This wasn’t as much of a grind as the TZ was…Whew….now I can do a few other things.

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      2. Yes we did…we went out to eat and a little shopping. Because of the water heater going out…we went by the hardware store to get some parts… no making it to an antique store today…but a good time.

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  8. Congratulations on doing an entire series. What’s next? watched the entire Star Trek: The Original Series back in 2020. It was a fun experience right up until the end. There are some who have called the Finale the worst episode of the series. It’s not the best, but I know there are others that aren’t as good either.

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    1. After a year and a half of the Twilight Zone and now six months with this…I think I’ll stick with music and maybe a quick one post over a series (I have a post on House MD coming) but for a while…I’ll stick with music and the occasional movie.
      You are correct…there were much worse episodes than the last…like Spock’s Brain…that one is really bad…and two others in the last season…but 3 really bad ones out of 79 is not bad.

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      2. I really thought ab out The Night Stalker…Blaine….that is a good idea…there are only like 13 or so episodes….I tell you what….I might do that

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