Arena

In the pre-Klingon and pre-Borg Original Series episode Arena, Captain Kirk is involved in a one-on-one duel against an antagonistic and radical alien Other, the Gorn commander, played by Gary Coombs and Bobby Clark. The episode is entitled Kaijû Gôn tono Taiketus, or Duel With the Monster Gorn, in Japanese dubbing. The Enterprise and an alien Gorn spaceship are engaged in a high-speed interstellar chase after a belligerent act by the Gorns has decimated the Federation scientific base on planet Cestus Three. The Gorns have no transporter technology, but their spacecraft is capable of traveling faster than warp factor eight. The two adversarial ships enter a region of the galaxy belonging to the super-advanced Metrons, who do not permit battles with third parties to take place within sectors under their control. The Metrons act unilaterally to end the hostilities between the Enterprise and the Gorn spaceship. They seize control of both ships and disable all on board weapons systems. They beam down Kirk and the Gorn commander to an unpopulated, nearly barren class-M planetoid that has been artificially constructed in the past few hours for the express purpose of playing host to an enforced direct combat between them. Alone on the planetoid, cut off from their crews and from all digital and weapons technologies except a Translator, they are constrained by the Metrons to do battle to the death. The ship of the losing combatant will be destroyed along with him. The winning Commander and his ship will be allowed to continue safely on their way.

The Gorn vessel had savagely attacked the Earth observation outpost on Cestus Three, mercilessly massacring the largely defenseless scientists and their families. The aliens came in “at space normal speed” and carried out their atrocity with a powerful yet unfamiliar phaser-style weapon. The more than five hundred resident personnel tried to surrender, but this only incited the aggressors to push ahead with their relentless onslaught.

After the Enterprise entered orbit around the planet, Captain Kirk led a tactical landing party to the surface to investigate. It too was attacked, as was the starship itself a short time later. The unprovoked assault on the innocuous scientific installation, the landing party, and the Enterprise could only lead its interpreter to one conclusion. It was the probable prelude to a full-scale invasion. The perpetrator had ruthlessly laid a trap to find out what kind of military defenses were in the area. Now that they knew that theEnterprise is the only available protection in this outlying section of Federation space, “you must make certain that the alien vessel never reaches its home base,” as Mr. Spock advises Kirk. By overtaking and eradicating the assailants’ ship, the Enterprisecould delay the enemy’s next offensive and allow time for Starfleet to deploy additional defensive forces to the region. The Constitution-class starship sets out in hot pursuit of the Gorn ship, venturing into unexplored space.

The high-stakes hunt with propulsion systems in overdrive is suddenly brought to a screeching halt. Both ships drop out of warp for no apparent reason. In place at their stations on the bridge, Lt. Uhura informs Captain Kirk that the Enterpriseis being scanned. But the source of the scrutinizing sensors is not the alien craft. A resonant voice speaks:

We are the Metrons. You are one of two crafts which have come into our space on a mission of violence. This is not permissible… We have prepared a planetoid with a suitable atmosphere. You will be taken there, as will the Captain of the Gorn ship which you have been pursuing… You will each be totally alone… The place we have prepared for you contains sufficient elements for either of you to construct weapons lethal enough to destroy the other… The contest will be one of ingenuity against ingenuity, brute strength against brute strength. The results will be final. There will be no discussion.

Then Captain Kirk disappears.

The Gorn commander is a two-legged, scaly, lizard-like creature with a thick, almost impenetrable hide. He has a long tail, sharp teeth and claws, and resplendent eyes. He resembles a miniature tyrannosaur. Although he stands upright and possesses intelligence at approximately human level, the Gorn is less humanoid than most Star Trek aliens. He is endowed with immense physical strength, is clumsy in his movements, and makes a forceful hissing sound as he walks. With his greater height and “tremendous musculature,” the commander appears physically capable of crushing Captain Kirk with his bare hands. In the opening round of their struggle, Kirk uses all his strength to pick up a rock of substantial mass and hurl it at the Gorn’s chest. The impact has no effect. The Gorn commander counters by effortlessly lifting a boulder many times larger and heavier. Kirk  runs away just before his rival turns the massive object into a projectile. It smashes into the ground behind him, and scattering fragments cut into his leg. The Captain realizes that his only chance for survival is to outwit the Gorn with his ingenuity.

Stranded together in the Arena, Captain Kirk and the Gorn commander both have only one advanced technology at their disposal: the Translator. When the Metrons transported them to the surface of the planetoid, they supplied each combatant with a Translator-Communicator, allowing conversation between them to occur. Fastened to their belts are small, microphone-like white metal rods, a variation on the portable Universal Translator device used by Enterprise away team members to communicate with aliens. The standard hand-held instrument is a piece of peripheral equipment wirelessly connected to the server translation software on the ship’s main computer. Thanks to the electronic communications technology furnished by the Metrons, the Enterprise Captain and the television viewers are able to understand – in plain American English – what the Gorn commander is saying between his growls and grunts.

What the Gorn commander says to Captain Kirk via the Translator gadget gives away enough information to enable Kirk to figure out what he must do to defeat him. In the “adapted” James Blish version of the story, which appears to be a “more original” script, Kirk removes his Translator from its belt attachment and tries to call the Enterprise. The Metron spokesperson told Kirk while he was still on the bridge that communication with his crew would not be possible. Kirk decides to verify if this statement by the Metron was true. His attempt to raise the ship with his transmission device is overheard by the Gorn commander. “You forget, Captain. We cannot reach our ships. We are alone here, you and I — just one against the other.” (James Blish narrative version) From this reaction, Kirk induces that the Gorn commander underestimates Kirk’s intelligence and lacks subtlety in his own thinking. The Gorn jumped to the conclusion that Kirk forgot the information about the range of the communications device that the Metron had shared. If anything, Kirk’s action indicated an attitude of scientific skepticism as opposed to blind faith in authority. In the Blish adaptation, Captain Kirk proposes to the Gorn commander that they contemplate making a truce, and join forces to challenge the Metrons or figure a way out of the situation. “Out of the question,” the Gorn responds. “Let us not waste time in sentimental hopes. The rules are what they are. One of us must kill the other.” (James Blish narrative version) From these assertions, Kirk learns that the Gorn commander is single-minded in his consideration of options, and that he is prone to unquestioned compliance with externally-imposed rules or laws.

Using his resourcefulness, Captain Kirk gathers a specific combination of minerals – crackling sulfur, ordinary coal, stone-coating saltpeter, adamantine diamonds, and opaque flint – from the planetoid’s rocky, desert-like terrain. He mixes the sulfur, potassium nitrate, and finer-grade diamonds together as ingredients of a form of gunpowder. He produces sparks by friction from the flint to ignite a fire. He builds a primitive cannon from a hard metallic cylindrical tube object resembling a bamboo stalk which he has found. Speaking through the Translator, the Gorn Commander tries to persuade Kirk to give up the fight. “This is your opponent, Earthling,” he says in the televised version. “Wait for me. I shall be merciful and quick.” “Like you were at Cestus Three?” replies Kirk. “You established an outpost in our space,” retorts the Gorn. “You butchered helpless human beings,” Kirk interjects. “We destroyed invaders,” the Gorn Commander counters. “You have lost. Admit it to yourself. Stop running.”

Captain Kirk exploits what he has learned through the Translator about the strategic weaknesses of the Gorn commander to verbally manipulate him into a trap in a gully which KIrk has set. “All right, Gorn. Come and get me,” says Kirk in the Blish version. “I’m under the overhang.” (James Blish narrative version) Simplistically believing that the Captain is offering to surrender, the Commander hastens directly into the ambush with a satisfied hiss. Kirk fires the makeshift cannon straight at his torso. The Gorn is gravely wounded by the blow. He collapses against a ditch wall with a broken shoulder and deep cuts all over his body caused by the penetration of strewn diamond chips into his flesh. Captain Kirk has seemingly won the head-to-head contest of warriors.

Real communication or understanding between Captain Kirk and the Gorn commander – the fecund communication between a real self and a radical Other – begins to take place only after the “Universal” Translator has been turned off. Standing over the critically injured Gorn, sensing his own moment of triumph, Kirk’s first instinct is to grab the granite knife blade which the Gorn commander had intended to use on Kirk, and finish off the job. Just before plunging the dagger into one of the Gorn’s bleeding orifices, however, Kirk has the insight that the Gorn commander does not deserve to die merely to satisfy the requirements of the Metrons. Perhaps the Gorns had been justified, from their point of view, in attacking the Federation base at Cestus Three, and in being intimidated enough to turn and run by a ship as imposing as the Enterprise. Cestus Three belonged, after all, to a solar system in the Gorns’ sector of the galaxy. Their apparent offensive strike may have  been legitimately motivated by self-defense.

With this change of heart, Captain Kirk tosses the knife aside. Kirk has won, but refuses to kill his opponent. He stands, looks up at the sky, and addresses the Metrons. “I won’t kill him! Do you hear? You’ll have to get your entertainment someplace else!” At this point, many television viewers take Kirk’s declaration as their cue to switch channels and seek their dosage of media violence elsewhere. For those who remain, what follows is a long speechless silence, the quiescence of real communication. The Gorn commander’s Translator lays shattered on the ground, obliterated to bits by the potency of the cannon explosion. The Gorn no longer has any way of deciphering the denotation of Kirk’s words, but the reciprocal understanding between the two commanders is deep. They stare at each other for a long time without fear and with mutual compassion. Then the Gorn vanishes, beamed back to his ship by the intrigued and fascinated Metrons. A beautiful, adolescent-like humanoid figure appears on the sloping shelf of one of the rock formations. “Does my appearance surprise you, Captain?” the visible Metron says. “I am approximately fifteen hundred of your Earth years old.” “You surprise me,” the highly developed alien continues. “By sparing your helpless enemy, who surely would have destroyed you, you demonstrated the advanced trait of mercy, something we hardly expected.” It proposes to Kirk that he make the decision whether the alien that staged the combat to the death should demolish the Gorn ship or not. Kirk wants the latter to be allowed to leave peacefully. “We can talk [with the Gorn], maybe reach an agreement.” The Metron approves. “Perhaps in several thousand years, your people and mine shall meet to reach an agreement,” it says. “You are still half-savage. But there is hope. We will contact you when we are ready.”

French theorist Michel Foucault put forward the thesis that, in a hegemonic system, power is everywhere. As a principle of micro-organization, it produces the social. The individual “subject” is constructed in her economic-consumerist “needs,” linguistic discourse, and psychoanalytic sexual desire by an all-encompassing normalizing regime operating at the level of capillary and microphysical infiltration. (Discipline and Punish) This analysis of inescapable, irreversible power has been hugely influential in critical theory and feminist circles, and in studies of Star Trek. The conservative patriarchal ideology of the “metanarrative” pervades everything. The power system is opposed by the subversion of gender norms and willful radical “performativity” (see a certain interpretation of Voyager’s cyborg Seven of Nine). The female fluidity of identities or endless sign-slide that is advocated is strangely complicit with the malleable third-order bio-cybernetics of capitalism in its most advanced techno-cultural stage. Friction-free “business at the speed of light,” global financial flows, and the cyber-consumerism of differences are control strategies rethinking energetic turbulence and recombinant mutation as infinitely productive.

Foucault’s framework is confining because we can never challenge power unless we conceive it from the start as a reversible relationship. In Arena, an immanent reversion takes place as Captain Kirk turns the legitimacy of the law set down by the Metrons against itself. After outwitting the Gorn commander, Kirk refuses to kill his alien antagonist, even at the risk of the Metrons killing them both. He discovers something of more symbolic worth to him than his own life. By refusing to “exchange” the Metrons’ power on the level of circulation they propound, he points to Machiavelli’s secret that power “does not exist.” Kirk knows that there is no absolute power, especially in the era of simulation where power is so often the mise-en-scène of duplicity in rhetoric and images. If it is not exchanged, it disappears.