MovieChat Forums > Star Trek (1973) Discussion > the episode with satan.

the episode with satan.


Does anybody remember the episode where they imply that Satan wasn't an evil deity but a pretty much harmless alien? Am I the only one who can't believe this episode actually made it to air? Jesus, the writers are pretty much coming out and saying that christianity is BS... pretty controversial stuff... especially for a saturday morning cartoon.

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The Magicks of Megas-Tu

http://www.tv.com/star-trek-the-animated-series/the-magicks-of-megas-t u/episode/50598/summary.html

I have had it with these m** f** tribbles on my m** f** ship! - Capt James T. Kirk

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I was just thinking the exact thing.

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Eh, I don't think the writers were really trying to say all that. My impression was that the reason Lucifer "looked" like the devil was to show that you can't judge off of appearances and we can all get along, and so on. For a Saturday morning cartoon, yes, it does seem a little out of the ordinary as far as what's usually allowed. I don't really find it offensive though.

My beef with the episode is that it's pretty awful. Boring, outlandish plot, not much to chew on on a deeper level. One of my least favorite of the series, actually.

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I feel the completely different way: For me this episode is a very fascinating study about good and evil and prejudices and deceptions. And I also found it quite exciting when the landing party suddenly was in this witch trial.

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Agreed, the episode IS awful, just as you say, narnia4! Now just how many alien races have visited the Earth in the past?? EASILY the WORST episode of the animated series!

(By the way, the best one is "The Slaver Weapon".)

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One of the main themes of Star Trek in general is that religion itself is BS & that the universe is a much better place without it.
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If you only knew the power of the Dark Side!

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Yeah, our civilization has become a lot less selfish and greedy now that we've done away with God.

Reality is that you can take any concept, mix in some human beings, and totally screw it up.

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Well, we've hardly "done away with God"! Do you HONESTLY think our society has "done away with God"?!? Start by looking at any American money!

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ALAN, do you really think “In God We Trust” on American Money really effects how people behave?


Prayer is not allowed in Schools, people have literally sued and won for removal of Ten Commandments monuments in courthouses, and its pretty accepted that we ave to be Secular in a modern liberal Democracy.

That, and not all of us are American. I live in Tennessee but came from England. The Politically Correct crowd back home even sue little old ladies if they wear crosses on volunteer nurse stations.


We can also see the lovely “non-religious” Soviet Union tearing down Cathedrals and shooting Priest, which nowadays Atheists claim had nothing to do with Atheism...



The fact is that society trends now in lien with the secularist ideals of Roddenberry. While Christianity and other Religions have not died out, the Secularist Religion ( And it is a religion itself) has certainly become culturally dominant in our society as a planet.

But the promise of “no religion' has not come True. People are not more tolerant and open minded, they just shift their prejudices to something else that don't fit the new “Non-religious” mentality they have. People aren't less greedy and aren't more willing to help others either. In fact, most people agree the world has gotten worse, and people more selfish.

That's why the Secularism proposed by Roddenberry, or for that matter you and others on IMDb, is seen by me as such an enormous failure. It has all the same Faults “religion' has, and amplifies them because it never allows itself to be questioned and presents itself as the only cure for those flaws.


While I'm not saying Atheists must be immoral monsters, I do think Atheists should think really hard about the whole Enlightenment Mythology that Animates the present Humanism most of them belong to.

The problems most f them say are the fault of Religion are really not caused by belief in gods and supernatural powers but are created when people have a Paradigm that they think the whole world should follow and then proceed to force an is out of an ought, as Hume would say.

As soon as a Humanist declares that only Humanism holds the Truth, says Humanist beliefs cannot be questioned, and demands everyone else conform to his Humanist vision of how society should run he will proceed to harass those who do not conform to his vision. The same is True of followers of Ayn Rand's Objectivism, or Neitche's Realism.


The real cause of social problems is a very Human Trait of demanding abject subjection to ones own personal beliefs and others disagreeing. Not “Religion”.

The conflicts could just as easily be abolished if everyone became Catholic, or Eastern Orthodox, or embraced Sunni Islam. We'd all have the same outlook and social ideas then. Well sort of, as even in those groups there is disagreement in how we should interpret things. But we're just as likely to have peaceful coexistance if everyone united under Mother Church and submitted to the Pope as we are if we all Signed off on the Humanist Manifestos.

There really is no substantive difference.

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I agree with you totally. Most people on the left in particuler don't seem to understand any of that.

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Jesus, the writers are pretty much coming out and saying that christianity is BS... pretty controversial stuff... especially for a saturday morning cartoon.


This line made me laugh in its irony.

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"most people agree the world has gotten worse, and people more selfish" is arguably true. Of course, that's been true since the Ancient Greeks; most people look back at their childhood through rose-tinted glasses. Objectively speaking, we're doing pretty darn good; the 1950s, before all those court cases, was not a place where women or non-whites could do anything that would disturb the privilege of the white male, and murder rates, and many other crimes rates, have dropped a lot.

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There was one episode from TOS in particular where they come to an Earth-like planet that is run by Romans. The slaves are "Sun" worshippers, but in fact, as Uhura discovers, it's actually the "Son" as in son of God that the slaves worship.

So, despite atheistic hopes to the contrary, Star Trek does no eschew God.

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Speaking as a Christian who was raised in the church, I think its WAYYY past the time for Christians to start growing up and acting like it. A lot of my fellow Christians over the years don't drink, smoke or swear but they were biggest hypocritical *beep* I've ever encountered. A lot of people have gone to churches over the years to check it out and were immediately turned off by the cold hypocrisy practiced by regular church goers(Once I hit my late teens, I sure was.
So if Christians are worried about the marginalization of the faith in America, maybe they should try to improve themselves, first.

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Christianity ***IS*** BS. All religion is.

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Religion is Satan's doing. Not God's. God is really against religion. Religion creates dogma ,and people fight over religion. And if some of you don't know who God is. God is the Messiah, Yeshua Hamashiach. The enemy rebel angel tries to keep God hidden from others. We need Yeshua's help to see through his misleading tricks. The enemy gets more evil each day. He hates God just like he hates us. Beware of the enemy's lies.

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I was blown away by that episode. I found it one of the best of the series because of its subject matter, an alternate universe where belief has power over technology and the idea that Lucifer and 'sorcerers' were persecuted aliens.
Very ambitious stuff challenging the notions of primitive legends.





http://www.imdb.com/list/rJuB9UoASlQ/

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Does anybody remember the episode where they imply that Satan wasn't an evil deity but a pretty much harmless alien? Am I the only one who can't believe this episode actually made it to air? Jesus, the writers are pretty much coming out and saying that christianity is BS... pretty controversial stuff... especially for a saturday morning cartoon.


Downloading the series now...can't wait for this episode!

Calling a religion Bu11$41t that for it's principle player has a cosmic Jewish Zombie who is his own father is not all that controversial is it?

Bread and Circuses, just points to the fact that Jesus was just another human, like Bhuda, Mohammad, Ceasar, Hitler and the rest.

ScientistStrategistDrone EternalSupreme

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Good old militant atheists, swearing and recanting hate-filled sayings... Goodness, I really hope people gain more traction in the world. The last time I saw a speech of someone so angry at inferior religions, it was Hitler speaking it, not being mentioned it.

Oh the irony. Lol.

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As I recall, that episode actually was banned from being broadcast back in '73 somewhere in the Bible belt. Part of Texas, I think.

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Christianity IS bullshyte, like all religions are. Satan isn't real, so who cares if a fictional TV series alters his nature?

Incidentally, the character of Lucien (from TAS) was not Satan--he was Lucifer. In the Bible, they are not the same being.

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A lot of this discussion is very American centric when claiming that the importance of religion has declined for better or for worse.

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