We open the episode with more than 4 billion people entirely missing from the sector the Enterprise is searching. There is no substantial evidence pointing to any known explanation for the absence of life. Our mystery begins.
Episode Summary
Almost immediately the crew finds themselves under attack from a mystery energy source from an unknown, unseen enemy. The force of the energy is so great the Enterprise would not survive more than a few hits, and the speed of the attacks is so great, there is no way to outrun them. They fire on the unknown target only to discover that it absorbed the energy of the torpedo, without any damage whatsoever. Kirk takes the next step and hails the unidentified vessel.
Spock discovers the unidentified vessel to be less than a meter in length. After extensive communication attempts, the crew discovers the alien aboard the vessel to be one that communicates mathematically via binary. They are able to match English to binary communication to help the machine communicate with them via English. Shortly after the alien agrees to transport aboard the Enterprise. Scotty, Spock, McCoy, and Kirk rush to the transportation room to greet it, only to discover what appears to be a highly sophisticated machine.
Kirk interacting with NomadThe machine introduces itself as Nomad. Looking through the Enterprise's history data banks, Spock determines that Nomad is a probe that was sent out from Earth decades previous on a peaceful exploration mission to search for new life forms. On Earth Nomad was believed destroyed when hit by an asteroid. It appears, however, that somehow after being damaged by the collision, Nomad was repaired and relies on its limited, and corrupted memory banks for operation. As a result, Nomad has taken a new mission, to search for perfect life forms (perfection being measured by its own logical demands), and destroy any less than perfect life forms as a type of parasitic infestation.
Kirk realizes he has brought aboard the ship a mechanism that must eventually destroy them all. Soon after both Uhura and Scotty are attacked. Our chief Engineer is killed, and Uhura is left without brain damage, but with total memory erasure.
Episode Tidbits
Uhura's singing, which we haven't heard much of since early in the first season, gets the crew into trouble. Nomad is attracted by the sound of her song, since music is something Nomad is unfamiliar with. When Nomad asks Uhura to explain what music is, she does so in a way that is of course illogical. Nomad zaps her brain, and then kills Scotty as he tries to stop Nomad from the scan. Believing Kirk to be his creator, however, Nomad offers to repair Scotty, and inexplicably brings him back to life. We discover, however, that the machine is unable to repair his damage to Uhura. Her memory banks have been wiped clean. Instead, Uhura must be entirely reeducated. Nurse Chapel becomes her teacher. As we watch Uhura's reeducation, however, it is only English that has been lost from Uhura's memory. She often reverts to speaking in Swahili. According to this episode, it would seem 'primitive' languages do not get recorded in the same memory banks English does.
"The Changeling" presents itself as the prototype episode for what later becomes the first Star Trek movie. There, of course, VYGR originates as the Voyager probe that was launched from Earth in the 1980's but having traveled far past the edges of our galaxy, and encountered other life forms that add to its structure, it appears as a very different entity than it did originally. In "The Changeling" Nomad appears similar in structure to how it did at launch, but now understands its programming very differently. In "The Changeling" Nomad is not searching to resolve its lonliness as we will later see VYGR struggling to do. But the idea for such a possibility is latent in this episode. Kirk repeatedly refers to the probe thinking of Kirk as its mother. So, while Nomad in no way behaves emotionally, Kirk speaks of it as though it wants a familial relation. The VYGR situation would seem to be a simple expansion of this idea.
Awesomely, Spock mindmelds with the machine to the high drama of stringed background music. In the mindmeld, Spock encounters incredible knowledge and depth within the machine, but then becomes locked into the binary thinking cycle. Kirk is able to break the cycle Spock is stuck in and discover the history of the probe from Spock's experience. What we hear is that Nomad was severely damaged deep in space, but encountered an alien probe that had repair powers. The two combined and became a new probe form with incredible power, and the inclination to destroy any life form less than perfect.
Episode Quotations
"Intelligence does not necessarily require bulk, Mister Scott." --Spock
"It will find the Earth infested with imperfect biological units." --Spock "And it will carry out its prime directive--to sterilize." --Kirk
"Your logic is impeccable, Captain. We are in grave danger." --Spock
"My congratulations, Captain, a dazzling display of logic." --Spock "You didn't think I had it in me, did you, Spock." --Kirk "No, Captain." --Spock
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