Star Trek Review: BALANCE OF TERROR

Director Vincent McEveety's, "BALANCE OF TERROR," is a classic tale of space warfare. McEveety also directed, "Dagger of the Mind" and "Patterns of Force". He also directed the Disney features, "Million Dollar Duck" and "Herbie goes Bananas".

Mark Lenard brings strength and dignity to the role of the Romulan Commander. Lenard went on to great fame in the Star Trek universe, as Sarek, Spock's father. He appeared in this role in the classic "Trek" episode, "Journey to Babel", the "Star Trek" features 3, 4, and 6, as well as, "Star Trek: The Next Generation" television episodes.

Writer Paul Schneider's script basically takes elements of World War II sea battles, between surface ships and submarines, and transposes them into space in the future. The result is one of the most exciting examples of space warfare contained in ANY of the classic "Star Trek" episodes. Schneider also wrote the classic "Trek" episode, "The Squire of Gothos," and the animated episode, "The Terratin Incident".

"BALANCE OF TERROR" introduced the alien Romulans, the Neutral Zone that separates Federation from Romulan space/territory, and the Cloaking Device which allows Romulan ships to become invisible. The Cloaking Device, a neat Sci-Fi gimmick, went on to pop up in other episodes, as well as some of the feature films.

The Romulan "Bird of Prey" ship model looked pretty cool at the time. It looks rather quaint by today's hi-tech standards, however.

"BALANCE OF TERROR "should be highly watchable for most Sci-Fi viewers. Mark Lenard fans will enjoy seeing him in a pre-Sarek role. "Live Long and Prosper", Mark!

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