| Star Trek Review: WOLF IN THE FOLD
Director Joseph Pevney's, WOLF IN THE FOLD, effectively manages to bring
Jack the Ripper into the "Star Trek" universe. Pevney also
directed the classic Trek episodes: "The Deadly Years" and
"Catspaw," among others.
This is an unusual episode, in that the focus is on Scotty, who is accused
of multiple murders of women. James Doohan, a strong, reliable performer,
is more than up to the occasion.
Robert Bloch's Teleplay, for WOLF IN THE FOLD, is based on his Story,
"Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper", first published in 1943. Bloch's
concept for "Wolf" is that Jack the Ripper in fact was an
inhuman entity that followed man into space when he took to the stars,
going on an interplanetary killing spree. The fact that the Victorian
murderer, known as Jack the Ripper, was never caught helps make the
story concept work. Bloch, a frequently published novelist, also wrote
the scripts for the classic Trek episodes: "What Are Little Girls
Made Of?" and "Catspaw".
John Fiedler ("Kolchak-The Night Stalker", "The Twilight
Zone") is convincing as Hengist, an Argelian official who has been
taken over by the Ripper entity. It's fun to see the meek and mild Fiedler,
who sometimes played a patient on TV's, "The Bob Newhart Show",
talking death and destruction.
A key plot point has the crew of the Enterprise receiving tranquilizer
shots so they won't be scared when the Ripper entity takes over the
ship's computer. It's interesting to see how "Star Trek" sometimes
echoed the attitude that "Drugs will solve your problems,"
which also was an attitude of the Sixties.
WOLF IN THE FOLD should be highly watchable for most Sci-Fi fans. Scotty/James
Doohan fans will particularly dig this one.
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